Sana Bogle
CG Human Paragon 1 / Sha'ir 1 / Human Paragon +2 / Geomancer 7 / Blood Magus 1 / Dread Witch 5 / Blood Magus +1 / Geomancer +2
Sana Bogle / all alone
Lost and hungry / skin and bone
Watch her come now / run and hide
Or she'll give you / quite the fright
Spoiler: I made a meme
Spoiler: BackstoryLong, long ago, there was a little girl. She was kind and gentle and curious, and yet none of the other children in the village wanted to be her friend. Never was she invented to join their pretend-plays, their scavenger hunts, or their sleepovers. And so the little girl would wander the woods all by her lonesome, and sit by the babbling brook, and talk to it merrily.
One day, it began to talk back.
The brook offered her friends, lots and lots of them, and endless warm summer nights and smiles and no bedtime at all. And the little girl accepted happily, and was whisked away to a magic place where all she had been promised came true, and she made friends with the fairies and spirits who lived there, and they played all day long and had the best time.
But then, one day, something went wrong when playing, and the little girl just laid there, eyes unblinking and unfocused, some weird red jelly streaming down the back of her head. The fairies tried and tried, but nothing they did made the little girl get up again, not even when they looked for all the cracks in her body and fixed them right up. This made the fairies very sad, and they cried a small lake, but at last the cleverest of them spoke up, and told the others that humans had something called a soul that made them move and talk and breathe, and the little girl must've lost hers.
So the fairies all split up and crawled through the mud and the clouds and places beyond, looking for the little girl's soul. And when they came back, they all proudly showed the little bits of soul they'd found, and carefully put it back inside of their playmate. But nothing they did seemed to work, and when they tried to take the bits of soul out again, they could not find them.
At this, the fairies got really scared, and they ran over to the babbling brook, and asked it what they were to do. The brook got very angry at them, and they hid under rocks and behind trees, but at last it calmed down and went over to the girl. And though he fixed her right up, and she walked and talked and breathed again, he too could not take out the little bits of soul.
The little girl, who never quite realized what had happened, went right back to playing with her friends, but discovered that they had now become scared of her. She didn't look the same, they said. She kept scratching at her skin, they said. She was creepy now, they said. This made her really sad, and she cried and cried until the babbling brook came, who said that it was best if she went home again. That made her even sadder, because she was not quite sure what home was anymore, so the babbling brook gave her a little friend made of dewdrops and laughter, and that made her happy enough to agree to leaving.
Now the little girl, who by now is not very little anymore, walks the earth again, roaming the ruins of what, a long time ago, was her village. Sometimes people find her, and try to do bad things to her, but she's really good at making them go away (without hurting them; she does not like to hurt people). She knows, vaguely, that her head is not quite right anymore, that something that isn't her gets her brain really mad sometimes, especially when she's distracted by doing magic. On good days, she forgets about this right away.
And so she waits, kind and gentle as ever, hoping another friend will soon come by...
Spoiler: Build TableAbility scores: 10/10/14/14/8/18, all increases to charisma.
Human Paragon class skills: Chosen skills are Bluff, Concentration, Diplomacy, Hide, Knowledge (Arcana), Knowledge (Nature), Move Silently, Intimidate, Spellcraft, Use Magic Device
Languages: Common, Aquan, and Sylvan.
Level Class Base Attack Bonus Fort Save Ref Save Will Save Skills Feats Class Features 1st Human Paragon 1 +0 +0 +0 +2 Bluff 2, Concentration 4, Diplomacy 4, Intimidate 4, Knowledge (Arcana) 4, Knowledge (Nature) 4, Move Silently 1, Spellcraft 1, Use Magic Device 4 Tireless, Able LearnerHB Adaptive Learning (Intimidate), Guisarme Proficiency 2nd Sha'ir 1 +0 +0 +0 +4 Concentration +1 (5), Diplomacy +1 (5), Intimidate +1 (5), Knowledge (Arcana) +1 (5), Knowledge (Nature) +1 (5) - Spellcasting, Summon Gen Familiar 3rd Human Paragon 2 +1 +0 +0 +5 Bluff +1 (3), Concentration +1 (6), Diplomacy +1 (6), Intimidate +1 (6), Knowledge (Arcana) +1 (6), Knowledge (Nature) +1 (6), Use Magic Device +2 (6) Nymph's Kiss, Great FortitudeHPB 4th Human Paragon 3 +2 +1 +1 +5 Bluff +2 (5), Concentration +1 (7), Diplomacy +1 (7), Intimidate +1 (7), Move Silently +2 (3) Use Magic Device +1 (7) - +2 Charisma 5th Geomancer 1 +2 +3 +1 +7 Concentration +1 (8), Diplomacy +1 (8), Hide +1 (1), Intimidate +1 (8), Knowledge (Arcana) +2 (8), Move Silently +1 (4), Use Magic Device +1 (8) - Drift 1 (Hair becomes vines), Spell Versatility 0 6th Geomancer 2 +3 +4 +1 +8 Concentration +1 (9), Diplomacy +1 (9), Intimidate +1 (9), Knowledge (Arcana) +1 (9), Spellcraft +1 (2), Use Magic Device +1 (9), Never Outnumbered Skill Trick Imperious Command Drift 1 (Feathers), Ley Lines (Forest) +1, Spell Versatility 1 7th Geomancer 3 +4 +4 +2 +8 Concentration +1 (10), Diplomacy +1 (10), Intimidate +1 (10), Knowledge (Arcana) +1 (10), Move Silently +1 (5), Spellcraft +2 (4), Use Magic Device +1 (10) - Drift 2 (Dryad's Beauty), Spell Versatility 2 8th Geomancer 4 +5 +5 +2 +9 Concentration +1 (11), Diplomacy +1 (11), Intimidate +1 (11), Knowledge (Arcana) +1 (11), Move Silently +1 (6), Spellcraft +2 (6), Use Magic Device +1 (11) - Drift 2 (Elk's Swiftness), Spell Versatility 3 9th Geomancer 5 +5 +5 +2 +9 Concentration +1 (12), Diplomacy +1 (12), Hide +1 (2), Intimidate +1 (12), Knowledge (Arcana) +1 (12), Spellcraft +2 (8), Use Magic Device +1 (12) Toughness Drift 3 (Antlers), Spell Versatility 4 10th Geomancer 6 +6/+1 +6 +3 +10 Concentration +1 (13), Diplomacy +1 (13), Hide +2 (4), Intimidate +1 (13), Knowledge (Arcana) +1 (13), Spellcraft +1 (9), Use Magic Device +1 (13) - Drift 3 (Gills), Ley Lines (Forest) +2, Spell Versatility 5 11th Geomancer 7 +7/+2 +6 +3 +10 Concentration +1 (14), Diplomacy +1 (14), Hide +1 (5), Intimidate +1 (14), Move Silently +1 (7), Knowledge (Arcana) +1 (14), Spellcraft +1 (10), Use Magic Device +1 (14) - Drift 4 (Wolverine's Rage), Spell Versatility 6 12th Blood Magus 1 +7/+2 +8 +3 +10 Concentration +1 (15), Diplomacy +1 (15), Intimidate +1 (15), Knowledge (Arcana) +1 (15), Spellcraft +1 (11), Use Magic Device +1 (15) Intimidating Rage Blood Component, Durable Casting, Stanch 13th Dread Witch 1 +7/+2 +8 +3 +12 Concentration +1 (16), Diplomacy +1 (16), Intimidate +1 (16), Knowledge (the planes) +2 (2), Use Magic Device +1 (16) Unnatural WillDWB Master of Terror 14th Dread Witch 2 +8/+3 +8 +3 +13 Concentration +1 (17), Diplomacy +1 (17), Intimidate +1 (17), Knowledge (the planes) +2 (4), Use Magic Device +1 (17) - Absorb Fear 15th Dread Witch 3 +8/+3 +9 +4 +13 Concentration +1 (18), Diplomacy +1 (18), Intimidate +1 (18), Knowledge (the planes) +2 (6), Use Magic Device +1 (18) Raging Luck Fearful Empowerment 1/day 16th Dread Witch 4 +9/+4 +9 +4 +14 Concentration +1 (19), Diplomacy +1 (19), Intimidate +1 (19), Knowledge (the planes) +2 (8), Use Magic Device +1 (19) - Delay Fear, Greater Master of Terror 17th Dread Witch 5 +9/+4 +9 +4 +14 Concentration +1 (20), Diplomacy +1 (20), Intimidate +1 (20), Knowledge (the planes) +3 (11) - Fearful Empowerment 2/day, Horrific Aura, Reflective Fear 18th Blood Magus 2 +10/+5 +10 +4 +14 Concentration +1 (21), Diplomacy +1 (21), Intimidate +1 (21), Knowledge (the planes) +3 (14) Heroic Companion Scarification 19th Geomancer 8 +11/+6/+1 +11 +4 +15 Concentration +1 (22), Diplomacy +1 (22), Intimidate +1 (22), Knowledge (the planes) +2 (16), Spellcraft +3 (14) - Drift 4 (Scent), Spell Versatility 7 20th Geomancer 9 +11/+6/+1 +11 +5 +15 Concentration +1 (23), Diplomacy +1 (23), Intimidate +1 (23), Knowledge (Arcana) +2 (17), Spellcraft +3 (17) - Drift 5 (Feathered Wings), Spell Versatility 8
Spoiler: SpellsSpells per Day
Level 0lvl 1st 2nd 3rd 4th 5th 6th 7th 8th 9th 1st - - - - - - - - - - 2nd 4 3 - - - - - - - - 3rd 5 4 - - - - - - - - 4th 5 5 2 - - - - - - - 5th 5 6 4 - - - - - - - 6th 5 6 4 2 - - - - - - 7th 5 6 5 4 - - - - - - 8th 5 7 6 4 2 - - - - - 9th 5 7 6 5 4 - - - - - 10th 5 7 7 6 4 2 - - - - 11th 5 7 7 5 5 4 - - - - 12th 5 7 7 6 5 4 2 - - - 13th 5 7 7 6 5 4 2 - - - 14th 5 7 7 6 5 5 4 - - - 15th 5 7 7 6 6 5 4 1 - - 16th 5 7 7 7 6 5 5 4 - - 17th 5 7 7 7 6 6 5 4 1 - 18th 5 7 7 7 6 6 5 5 3 - 19th 5 7 7 7 6 6 6 5 3 1 20th 5 7 7 7 6 6 6 5 4 3
Spells Known
Level 0lvl 1st 2nd 3rd 4th 5th 6th 7th 8th 9th 1st - - - - - - - - - - 2nd 5 3 - - - - - - - - 3rd 6 3 - - - - - - - - 4th 6 4 - - - - - - - - 5th 7 4 2 - - - - - - - 6th 7 5 3 - - - - - - - 7th 8 5 3 2 - - - - - - 8th 8 6 4 3 - - - - - - 9th 9 6 4 3 2 - - - - - 10th 9 7 5 4 3 - - - - - 11th 9 7 5 4 3 2 - - - - 12th 9 8 6 5 4 3 - - - - 13th 9 8 6 5 4 3 - - - - 14th 9 8 6 5 4 3 2 - - - 15th 9 9 7 6 5 4 3 - - - 16th 9 9 7 6 5 4 3 2 - - 17th 9 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 - - 18th 9 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 - 19th 9 9 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 - 20th 9 9 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2
Spells known (level learned):
0: Detect Magic (2), Ghost Sound (2), Light (2), Prestidigitation (2), Read Magic (2), Caltrops (3), Disrupt Undead (5), Mending (7), Arcane Mark (9)
1: Blockade (2), Grease (2), Mage Armor (2), Summon Monster I (4), Enlarge Person (6), Friendly Face (8), Instant Diversion (10), Cause Fear (12), Benign Transposition (15)
2: Web (5), Deflect (5), Invisibility (6), Eagle's Splendour (8), Familiar Pocket (10), Scare (12), Detect Thoughts (15), Snake's Swiftness (17), Doom (19)
3: Permeable Form (7), Stinking Cloud (7), Dispel Magic (8), Haste (10), Greater Mage Armor (12), Alter Fortune (15), Disobedience (17), Daylight (19)
4: Polymorph (9), Voice of the Dragon (9), Ruin Delver's Fortune (10), Friendly Fire (12), Dimension Door (15), Solid Fog (17), Greater Invisibility (19)
5: Summon Monster V (11), Mind Fog (11), Swift Etherealness (12), Dominate Person (15), Teleport (17), Dismissal (19)
6: Greater Dispel magic (14), Wages of Sin (14), Summon Monster VI (15), Ghost Trap (17), Forcecage (19)
7: Plane Shift (16), Constricting Chains (16), Forcecage (18), Greater Teleport (20)
8: Maze (18), Sunburst (18), Irresistible Dance (19)
9: Dominate Monster (20), Prismatic Sphere (20)
Sana can usually retrieve spells on an encounter-by-encounter basis, and prefers to have a few swift and a few standard-action spells to get two rages a turn when needed. When she's able to fit a single divine spell in there, the best option is the Luck domain's underleveled Freedom of Movement, with Dispel Law, Earthquake, and Divination all occasionally useful as well.
Spoiler: SpotlightsECL 5
At low levels, we're a basic charisma-based caster. The sha'ir's quirky spell preparation mechanism lets us quickly retrieve random sorc/wiz utility spells, and maxed social ranks combine with 21 charisma and Nymph's Kiss to grant us insane Intimidate and Diplomacy bonuses (+17 to both at ECL 5). We also have a water gen familiar that can fly, swim, and make use of our stealth ranks when scouting. It's probably an alright scout, though for now (foreshadowing!) it's mainly an awkward spell preparation mechanism. That said, it can use a lot of magic items (being humanoid and capable of speech) so maybe offload random wands or other magic loot on to it.
We improve on the basic Sha'ir into Geomancer progression by heading into Human Paragon, which gives us a bonus feat, +2 charisma, a cherrypicked list of skills (that with Able Learner become essentially permanent class skills), and guisarme proficiency.
Why a guisarme? We have 10 strength and +2 BAB, so not to make melee attacks. The answer is twofold; firstly a reach weapon improves our threatened area, which lets us Demoralize foes 10 ft. away (not quite relevant now, but soon it'll be). Secondly, tripping only cares about strength and size, not BAB, meaning we're at least passable at it: if a 16 strength fighter charges us, we have reasonable odds of landing an AoO trip and winning the 1d20 vs 1d20+3 contest. It's a last resort, but not an insignificant one, and it sure beats praying for a low attack roll. Note that we can switch between holding our guisarme in one hand and wielding it in two as a free action, so somatic components won't be a problem.
Our spells include Mage Armor and Deflect for defense, Grease and Web for BFC, and Blockade and Summon Monster I to put some things between ourselves and enemies. As the levels go on, we'll have a slight preference for swift/immediate action spells and magic with a visual component: you'll soon see why.
ECL 10
A bunch of Geomancer levels leave us with various physical mutations, most notably granting us +4 Diplomacy (useful when preparing spells) and a gore attack (useful to threaten adjacent foes in addition to nonadjacent ones). Outside of that, we're mostly advancing sha'ir casting with slightly better HD, saves, and skills than actual sha'ir levels would've given us. We also grab Imperious Command and Never Outnumbered. Intimidation is still just a side business for us, but forcing substantial saves vs Cowering once per encounter is rather nice.
Notable spells include Friendly Face and Voice of the Dragon for optimizing Diplomacy, Enlarge Person, Haste, and Eagle's Splendour as buffs, Familiar Pocket to keep our little XP liability safe, and Ruin Delver's Fortune to turn our sizeable 22 charisma into a defensive bonus. Instant Diversion is a stylish way to escape melee, creating several illusionary doubles that can bait enemy AoOs for us. Polymorph is its own amazing self.
ECL 12 (SWEET SPOT)
With another level of Geomancer to get 'rage like a wolverine', as well as a level of Blood Magus, the build's main trick has come online.
See, Geomancer says you enter a rage 'if you take damage'. Blood Magus lets us use our own blood as a component when casting spells, which deals 1 damage to us, so every time we cast a spell we can immediately start raging afterwards. This activates Intimidating Rage, allowing for a free action demoralize attempt. If we fail, we just dismiss the rage (negating the fatigue with Tireless) and cast a swift action spell to enter rage a second time in one turn. Spells fuel rage, which fuels demoralize attempts, which keeps your foes away from you (the caster) and within reach of your Grease, Web, or summons' full attacks, allowing you to stick around and cast more spells.
Now, and this is critical, we want to stay raging when it's not our turn. +2 Fortitude, +2 Will, and +2 HP/level are all significant defensive buffs, and +4 strength helps with our guisarme trip technique (which, I want to stress again, scales surprisingly well). Ending rage isn't stated to be an action, so you can possibly do it even when it's not your turn, in which case even immediate action spells remain castable. If your DM rules against that, just dismiss rage when you think you might need Ruin Delver's Fortune in the coming round, and don't be afraid to switch it back on with a Deflect or Permeable Form when necessary.
(Obviously, don't dismiss rage if losing the extra HP would kill you: just down a potion or intimidate someone and realize a normal caster would have died there)
ECL 15
Raging Luck gives us a free action point every time we rage, which is every time we cast a spell and then some. That's 3d6b1 added to a roll of your choice (averaging slightly less than a +5 bonus). We'll typically use it to boost the Intimidating Rage check, but you could keep it in reserve to improve a saving throw or even a guisarme trip attempt (going from a +0 to +7 modifier in an instant feels great, and more importantly gives great odds to trip all sorts of casters and even weaker strength-types). Not only is rage directly boosting our survivability, it's indirectly doing so as well.
Speaking of Intimidate, we've started taking levels in Dread Witch (despite Sana looking and acting like a horror movie villain, all these classes are compatible with Exalted CGs!), giving us a scaling Intimidate bonus, a big bonus against fear and the ability to absorb it for our own benefit, and the 1/day ability to apply the Shaken condition with a spell. We're mostly here for the intimidate bonus, but a lot of our spells are compatible and free debuffs are never bad.
Spells like Greater Mage Armor and Alter Fortune further improve our survivability, Wages of Sin is a great way to deal with Evil foes, and Summon Monster V and VI give us some muscle for dealing with magic-resistant foes. Swift Etherealness is the ultimate escape button, and you can delay the Intimidating Rage check to when you reappear 1 round later. Friendly Fire is a very fun and underrated answer against ranged attacks, which are otherwise a bit of a concern, and lets you no-save turn enemies' attacks against them. You can even cast it as an immediate action!
ECL 20
Our Rage-fueled action points have two awkward sides. The first is that we can generate two per round, but are prohibited from actually spending both. The second is that we only have the action points while raging, which means we can't use them to boost skills that rely on patience and concentration (Knowledge, Spellcraft, Use Magic Device). However, with Heroic Companion, our gen familiar can access the second action point and use it on Rage-locked skills (or, sometimes, its own saving throws). With its Intelligence and Dexterity exceeding ours, frequently the best course of action when making a check will be to cast a cantrip, take 1 damage, get mad, and delegate our familiar to make the actual check: how many builds can say they use Rage to augment their knowledge rolls? (UMD ranks are optimized so that with a +4 bonus from the action point and a roll of 2, our familiar succeeds on the DC 25 checks to activate items blindly)
Our final class levels give us more bonuses with Fear spells and the ability to apply them to normally immune targets, a touch attack that Panics (and whose to-hit benefits from the Rage strength bonus!), Scent and wings from geomancer, and a creepy Scribe Scroll variant from Blood Magus. The latter interacts very favorably with Sha'ir: you can look for powerful divine spells (Miracle!) during downtime, inscribe them, and not have to worry about waiting 1d6+9 hours when it matters anymore.
Spoiler: Final metricsAll listed statistics are before factoring in items.
Our base caster level is 18. Blood Magus improves this by 1 if we damage ourselves while casting. Dread Witch lets us absorb fear effects (even our own) to fuel a CL increase of up to +3. While in a forest, our CL increases by another 2.
Our save DC is 10+level+7. Dread Witch adds +2 to the DC if we're casting a Fear spell (our 2/day Fearful Empowerment can make any spell qualify).
Our saves are +15/+5/+14, with an addition +2 Will and Fortitude while raging, an additional +7 on saves against Fear, and various spells (Like Ruin Delver's Fortune) helping out on the side. Note that despite looking like a wizard, our Fortitude is on par with a fighter's, which should pose a nasty surprise to anyone trying to hit a Disintegrate.
We have 8+1d4+2d8+9d6+2d6+5d4+40+3 = 113 HP, or 153 while raging. Our HP while not raging is comparable to a 14 constitution rogue. While raging, it's that of a 16 constitution cleric. While we don't exactly enjoy attacks coming our way, we're not quite as frail as the full caster role implies, and can certainly hang around melee even if we don't want to join it.
Our Diplomacy modifier is +38 (+7 charisma, 23 ranks, +2 Nymph's Kiss, +4 Dryad's Beauty, +2 Synergy). We can boost this further with Eagle's Splendour (+2), Friendly Face (+5 against non-hostile creatures), and Voice of the Dragon (+10).
Our Intimidate is +44 (+7 charisma, 23 ranks, +2 Nymph's Kiss, +10 Dread Witch, +2 Synergy), which is buffed by Voice of the Dragon as well; if we make the check while raging, we can add an action point to add around +5 to the result.
Spoiler: SourcesSha'ir - Dragon Compendium
Human Paragon - UA
Geomancer - Complete Divine
Blood Magus - Complete Arcane
Dread Witch - Heroes of Horror
Tireless - Player's Guide to Faerun
Able Learner - Races of Destiny
Nymph's Kiss - Book of Exalted Deeds
Imperious Command - Drow of the Underdark
Intimidating Rage - Complete Warrior
Raging Luck - Eberron Campaign Setting
Heroic Companion - Magic of Eberron
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2023-02-21, 02:15 AM (ISO 8601)Ogre in the Playground
- Join Date
- Apr 2019
Sana Bogle
Last edited by pabelfly; 2023-02-21 at 05:16 PM.
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