[3.5] healing hellfire damage with constraints

[SaltyEmperorX]

OK, so in the campaign I am about to play in I want to play warlock. The DM is a HUGE stickler for rules and knows the tricks or eldritch glaive. I have only played two campaigns before this. We begin "at ECL 15. You have 200,000 Gold Pieces to spend. No more than 100,000 may be spent on a single item." He is going to audit all of our characters thoroughly to make sure everything is in check. So far, we are not allowed flaws, psionics, weapon maneuvers and such (from the Tome of Battle), incarnum (Magic of Incarnum), Pacts, True Name, or Shadow magic (Tome of Magic). This removes the possibility of using soulmelds or vestiges for ability healing. He also sees the eldritch glaive as a ray using dex and not str as a melee attack, so no PA or str bonus damage. I asked him about lvls in bloodlines, and he does not read it as having hellfire max out at +12d6 with the 3 additional lvls. He also requires that super-variant rules be reviewed by him in case of mega cheese.

I think that is it... I know there are potions/wands/spells that heal ability damage, but I was just wondering if there were other ways of auto healing ability damage that would not interrupt a battle. Thanks much for anything anyone can recommend.

EDIT: I am pretty certain that it will be a dragon campaign if anyone has anything to offer on that.

[The_Snark]

Complete Champion has a spell (Body Ward) that absorbs a finite amount of ability damage (5-10). It's up to your DM whether you can use this to pay the price for hellfire, but as it's more like having temporary hit points than being immune, he might agree.

It's a cleric spell, and the duration isn't great (1 minute/level), but it's only second level, so it shouldn't be too hard to get a wand or convince one of your party members to help out. It won't give you unlimited all-day hellfire, but it'll help your endurance mid-battle quite a bit.

[W3bDragon]

Complete Champion has a spell (Body Ward) that absorbs a finite amount of ability damage (5-10). It's up to your DM whether you can use this to pay the price for hellfire, but as it's more like having temporary hit points than being immune, he might agree.

It's a cleric spell, and the duration isn't great (1 minute/level), but it's only second level, so it shouldn't be too hard to get a wand or convince one of your party members to help out. It won't give you unlimited all-day hellfire, but it'll help your endurance mid-battle quite a bit.

Based on his DM's interpretations, I'd probably say that he'd think (so would I) that ability damage that is self-inflicted must bypass all your defenses for the effect tied to the ability damage to work.

[Person_Man]

Note that the whole point of a Glaivelock is to force multiple Saving Throws per round, not to deal lots of damage. If you want to deal lots of damage, go play Sir Charge-a-lot or a full caster or the King of Smack. Hellfire Warlock is nifty, but if your DM wants to make it really inconvenient to play one, then just play something else.

[true_shinken]

He also sees the eldritch glaive as a ray using dex and not str as a melee attack, so no PA or str bonus damage.

It's not a ray, but it's not a weapon either. Check my guide to melee warlocks for more clarification on this issue. It can get pretty confusing.

I think that is it... I know there are potions/wands/spells that heal ability damage, but I was just wondering if there were other ways of auto healing ability damage that would not interrupt a battle. Thanks much for anything anyone can recommend.

Improved Familiar + Rod of Bodily Restoration is my favourite choice of hellfire healing.

[SaltyEmperorX]

Note that the whole point of a Glaivelock is to force multiple Saving Throws per round, not to deal lots of damage. If you want to deal lots of damage, go play Sir Charge-a-lot or a full caster or the King of Smack. Hellfire Warlock is nifty, but if your DM wants to make it really inconvenient to play one, then just play something else.

Yeah, I was getting to that point, but I just love all the goodies that come with being warlock. I could not find the Sir Charge-a-lot build, but I did find the King of Smack. KoS uses psionics right? The only thing is that we cannot use psionics.

[Greenish]

I could not find the Sir Charge-a-lot build

I think he meant a generic charger.

[Fouredged Sword]

I would point you to Legacy Champion for the ability to draw out hellfire warlock. You can use it to add 7 levels to a PrC in 10 levels. also you can take uncanny trickster (i think that's the one) to get another 2 for 3 levels.

This works, but depends on the wording of abilites. The ability must say it goes up every X levels, rather than having an increase at level x, level y and level z.

[Person_Man]

Yeah, I was getting to that point, but I just love all the goodies that come with being warlock. I could not find the Sir Charge-a-lot build, but I did find the King of Smack. KoS uses psionics right? The only thing is that we cannot use psionics.

Sir Charge-a-lot is a generic name for any build that uses Charge a lot. It's a staple of many low tier melee builds who have nothing better to do then deal a ton of damage.


What exactly do you want to do, and what books are you limited to?

[2xMachina]

Mitigate suffering also helps delay the con damage. You gotta spam lesser restoration later tho.

[SaltyEmperorX]

Sir Charge-a-lot is a generic name for any build that uses Charge a lot. It's a staple of many low tier melee builds who have nothing better to do then deal a ton of damage.


What exactly do you want to do, and what books are you limited to?

Thanks for that. I listed all the rules that he has banned in the OP, but he said that anything super variant or ambiguous will be reviewed by him. Aside from that, we are allowed any 3.5 rules.

I was more involved in support or story/out of battle game, so I would like to go for max damage output this time. I would prefer to go melee as opposed to magic simply because I am not familiar at all with spell rules and all that. And as I said before, he is making this a dragon campaign, so any help with that would be appreciated.

Thanks for all the advice so far. I will make sure to note the ability healing for future reference.


EDIT: I looked over a charger, and he seemed to use flaws and psionics...
EDITx2: But those might have just been psionic tattoos for extra damage and such.

[Greenish]

Thanks for that. I listed all the rules that he has banned in the OP, but he said that anything super variant or ambiguous will be reviewed by him. Aside from that, we are allowed any 3.5 rules.

I was more involved in support or story/out of battle game, so I would like to go for max damage output this time. I would prefer to go melee as opposed to magic simply because I am not familiar at all with spell rules and all that. And as I said before, he is making this a dragon campaign, so any help with that would be appreciated.

Hmm, a mounted charger with a (durable & fast) flying mount could be in order, perhaps a small race if you need to enter their lairs often.