Golem Crafter? (3.5)

[RationalGoblin]

How would you make a character specialized around creating Golems of all kinds? Including the ones in Dragon Magazine?

I know it's not a viable build, I just want to know what sort of character would be perfect at crafting golems.

[Alleine]

An artificer or the Effigy Master. Those would be best.

[Waspinator]

Artificer. You get free crafting XP to use for them plus you can use your Use Magic Device skill to emulate any spell you might need for the actual crafting. If you want constructs other than homunculi, you'll need to burn a feat, but other than that you don't really need anything that the Artificer class itself does not give you.

Oh, and thanks to that one homunculus, you can have constructs making constructs! Assembly line time!

[Irreverent Fool]

If all you care about is golem crafting, artificer is your best bet. A straight wizard is fine as well. Assuming you use all your bonus feats on the appropriate item creation feats, either a wizard or artificer will be able to craft the lesser golems and effigy creatures by level six.

Either way, I highly recommend picking up both the 'extraordinary artisan' and the 'legendary artisan' feats, which together will reduce xp and gp cost for all your creations by 25%.

I am currently playing a straight wizard who numbers among his allies a troll effigy, a wood golem, and two tin golems. The troll effigy is terrifying in combat, and the wood golem's regeneration keeps me from having to expend spell slots or wands/scrolls on repairing it. It's great fun. I hope you enjoy it!

obnoxious
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[RationalGoblin]

Alright, thanks. I don't know about the Effigy Master, and I don't have whatever book it's in, and neither do I have the book with the Artificer, so I'll just go straight Wizard.

Thanks again for the help everyone, especially Irreverent Fool.

[Waspinator]

Just FYI: Artificer is from the Eberron Campaign Setting.

[sonofzeal]

Alright, thanks. I don't know about the Effigy Master, and I don't have whatever book it's in, and neither do I have the book with the Artificer, so I'll just go straight Wizard.

Thanks again for the help everyone, especially Irreverent Fool.

Artificer is from Eberron Campaign Setting, gets a giant load of crafting feats for free, gets a "craft reserve" to reduce the XP drain of crafting, and gets "infusions" (kinda like spells) that are often awesome for buffing constructs specifically.

Effigy Masters are from Complete Arcane, are an easy-access, 4/5-casting PrC for Wizards that grants "Craft Effigy" as a bonus feat, makes effigies slightly better, and can scry on his effigy for free at higher levels.

Artificer technically can't qualify for Effigy Master, but if you can get that overruled then the overlap would be pretty fun.

[SoD]

Just popping in to say I misread the title as; Goblin Crafter? (3.5)

Leaving now.

Although a goblin crafter would be an interesting PC to play... *goes off to search books*

sincerely
SoD

[Sstoopidtallkid]

Just popping in to say I misread the title as; Goblin Crafter? (3.5)

Leaving now.

Although a goblin crafter would be an interesting PC to play... *goes off to search books*

sincerely
SoD

Isn't there an NPC class for applying grafts? Make one of those, homebrew a feat to reduce the cost to reflect experience with a certain race, and then adventure with a party of goblinoids. You'll be more well-loved than the Artificer.

[JeenLeen]

Isn't there an NPC class for applying grafts? Make one of those, homebrew a feat to reduce the cost to reflect experience with a certain race, and then adventure with a party of goblinoids. You'll be more well-loved than the Artificer.

In Lords of Madness, there's the Fleshcrafter or Fleshwarper, or some similiar name, PrC. You have to have the Graft Flesh feat from Libris Mortis It lets you graft any sort of flesh, even those normally limited, like abeloth. I suppose you could homebrew a goblin graft.

There's another PrC, I think in Complete Adventurer but I could be wrong, that reduces the time and maybe cost for making items. It requires that you be a gnome. Meister?

[Irreverent Fool]

I meant to weigh-in on the Effigy Master.

First of all, any character who takes craft construct can craft effigy creatures. Effigy masters have the benefit of being able to craft effigies without any of the appropriate feats, and their creations get some several minor bonuses that tend to add up.

It is a useful class primarily because it allows you to choose it later in your adventuring career without having built specifically for crafting constructs and because it allows you to craft constructs without taking craft magic arms and armor and craft construct. This means you essentially have two extra feats. Unfortunately, it has a prerequisite of 10 ranks in one of a number of craft skills, which means your first level of Effigy Master will be your eight character level at minimum. This particular oddity seems to partially negates the benefit of being able to craft effigies without the appropriate feat. You'll have a hard time arguing that this is some sort of typo either, as the sample effigy master is a wizard 7/effigy master 1.

It also isn't specific to arcane or divine magic. The only requirement aside from skill ranks is craft wondrous item.

The biggest bonus of the class is that you get to add your class level to your caster level for determining the maximum HD of effigies you create. Since the PrC advances spellcasting as well, this means with a few levels into the class, you can be making very very frightening things. At character level 12, you'll be able to create effigies with 17HD. --of course, your DM will probably limit you to creatures you've seen.

Its downside, of course, is that you lose one level of spell progression. This isn't the end of the world, but it is slightly annoying when any other casters in you party are gaining the next highest level of spells before you. If you think you don't care, then don't worry about it.

I don't think it's worth losing a caster level over, myself. The bonuses are nice, and making a construct that outshines any of the non-casters in the party seems cool at first, but I think you'll probably end up glancing through the spell lists and saying, "Oh man, what a cool spell. Too bad I can't cast it yet." Meanwhile, your fellow party members will be saying, "Oh man, what a cool monster we're fighting. Too bad we can't hit it because the DM had to make something that was remotely challenging for the Effigy Master's pet."

obnoxious
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