[3.5] Wuyleam, Favoured Bear of Sylvanus

[Reis Tahlen]

My Goblin Shaman has now left the adventuring lifestyle to fight evil by educating the next generation. So, I'm working on my next character, who will be a healer/buffer (as it is the missing role in the party, and I love playing full support character).

Oh, and I also love bears. I love 'em so much.

Therefore, I'm thinking of something like this:

Favoured Soul 2/Human Parangon 3/Sentinel of Bharai 3

The reasons:

Favoured soul: first of all, I do love healers, but I seriously HATE to search trough all books for my spell. And as I will absolutely not use debuff/damage spell, it will be easy to select a definitive spell list. Secondly, it has two of the three skills required for Sentinel of Bharai.

Human Parangon: for the third skill for Sentinel, plus gaining a few skills which could prove useful even at low levels. Plus, should allow me to gain Use Magic Items, and +2 to any Stats (Charisma, yeah).

Sentinel of Bharai: Bear. Healer Bear. Oh yeah...

The feats:

Level 1: Sacred Vows, Initate of Nature (Turning for Animals)
Level 2: (Human Parangon) Augment healing (+2 healing per spell level)
Level 3: Vow of Obediance
Level 6: Distance Contact Spell (don't know the english name) Allow to use a contact spell up to 9m for +2 spell level.

The stats:

Charisma to the max. No Wisdom: I'll not use any saving throw spells. I'm wondering if I could go "bear style" by pumping Strenght and Con (after all, Sylvanus favoured weapon is a two handed mace). But I'm really not sure about this part.

What do you think? The books I'm allowed to use are: Core, Complete Mage, Warrior, Adventurer and Divine, BoED, Faerun series, Draconomicon, aaaand... I think that's it.

[Urpriest]

Incidentally, I did not know that translated D&D books used meters. Makes sense though.

Augment healing is alright at low levels, but it's a bit weak. Touch of Healing might be a better choice, though I think it's from Complete Champion and as such you may not have access.

[HunterOfJello]

Initiate of Nature requires you to be a 5th level Druid or Cleric.

Augment Healing isn't a very good feat at all. Healing in DnD mainly occurs in either keeping someone alive during battle or spam casting wands on friends after a battle is over.

Vow of Obedience is pretty pointless as a feat. Being generally better at resisting compulsion isn't worth 2 feats. Some of the Vow feats can be worth the hastle. This one isn't.

~

As far as GOOD feats go:


Versatile Spellcaster can be your best friend. It will allow you to break up your spellcasting in a way envied by even prepared casters.

~

Also you may want to consider grabbing the Deity's Favor ACF. You give up your weapon bonuses to give scaling temporary hp to allies when you cast spells on them. It's useful to give a bit of bonus hp to an ally while casting a buff on them.

~

Finally, check out some of the homebrewed Favored Soul remakes that are on these boards. There are some much needed improvements in some of them that balance out the class. (One good example is allowing the FS to gain domains every few levels.)

[Urpriest]

Initiate of Nature requires you to be a 5th level Druid or Cleric.

Augment Healing isn't a very good feat at all. Healing in DnD mainly occurs in either keeping someone alive during battle or spam casting wands on friends after a battle is over.

Vow of Obedience is pretty pointless as a feat. Being generally better at resisting compulsion isn't worth 2 feats. Some of the Vow feats can be worth the hastle. This one isn't.

~

As far as GOOD feats go:


Versatile Spellcaster can be your best friend. It will allow you to break up your spellcasting in a way envied by even prepared casters.

~

Also you may want to consider grabbing the Deity's Favor ACF. You give up your weapon bonuses to give scaling temporary hp to allies when you cast spells on them. It's useful to give a bit of bonus hp to an ally while casting a buff on them.

~

Finally, check out some of the homebrewed Favored Soul remakes that are on these boards. There are some much needed improvements in some of them that balance out the class. (One good example is allowing the FS to gain domains every few levels.)

(I believe Vow of Obedience is a requirement for Sentinel of Bharrai, IIRC)

[Reis Tahlen]

Vow of Obedience is indeed mandatory for the Sentinel.

Our DM would not allow homebrew rules for the Favoured Soul; he, and me, think he's pretty good the way he is. Except perhaps the DC based on Wisdom, but it will not be a problem with my character concept.

I already used Augment Healing with my Shaman, and... Well, I thought it was quite good; it sort of "boost" your caster level beyond the standard limit. Casting a medium heal at 2D8 + 12 at 8th level seems a good thing for me. But perharps there're more interesting things to invest in, or other ways to boost healing?

Versatile spellcaster: isn't it the Feat to raise one of your caster level by 4, without exceeding your global level? I don't see the need, this character has a caster level of 7 at level 8, with only one caster class. Or perhaps I'm mistaken.

Initiate of Nature was only for the fluff, I have not made deep ressearches to improve this concept.

Someone advised me to try Bard instead of Favoured Soul for support, and use Wands for healing, but... meh... don't know, not sure.

Replacing Favoured Soul with Cleric could be a great boost, but I tend to prefer spontaneous spellcasting, and I don't see many Turning Feats which could be so interresting I could consider that route.

Alas, Complete Champion is indeed out of reach for me. Cursed be french speaking only DM

[Urpriest]

Versatile Spellcaster lets a spontaneous caster trade two lower-level spell slots for one higher-level spell slot, which is pretty good. I think it's outside your list of books though.

This build feels like it would enjoy some DMM-Persist shenanigans, but as a Favored Soul it would get clunky to fit in the turning. Most of the other feats that increase healing are divine, unfortunately.