Aura Master

[He who is Alway]

Good day to the Playground-

I am in the process of making my new toon for a 3.5 game and need help. though i am sure i have seen something similar to this in the past i am looking for any and all classes that have passive auras EX: paladin aura of good, marshal master of tactics.

stats came out as 8,9,11,16,8,14. I have not placed them yet but DM says no rerolls hence why I want the passive effects that don't need much from stats.

Any ideas?

[The-Mage-King]

Dragon Shaman has them, and you can pick up some other good ones in Dragon Magic.

EDIT: Try a Dragonblood Human Marshal/White Raven Warblade. That should work...

[Tavar]

The problem is that none of the official aura classes can actually do a decent job. The aura's are, as a rule, weak, giving minor and situational bonuses.

And for non-stat dependency, a better bet is a Warlock or a Druid.

[Glimbur]

Marshal, Dragon Shaman, and Bard all do party buffs in ways that are not dependent on stats. Of the three Bard is generally considered the most powerful: as a core class they got a lot of love from splat books.

Warlock is also a pretty solid choice for a class if your stats are less than what you want: throw the 16 into Con, the 14 into Dex, and don't take invocations with saves.

[Greenish]

Dragonfire Adept can pick up Dragonic Auras with feats, and are truly SAD (you only need Con). They have the advantage over Marshal and Dragon Shaman of being an actually good class.

[Fax Celestis]

You could try my warlord class.

[He who is Alway]

I was also thinking about just multiclassing to have like 8 auras...though not nearly as effective as power-gaming, but could still be fun.

[Tyndmyr]

Bard. Well, if you count singing as an aura.

In fact, a spellcaster that focuses on aura-like spells is fairly able to perform well. Dipping marshal and the like is not particularly synergistic with spellcasting, but in the specific instance of having lots of auras up, collecting the good bits of as many classes as possible is likely the most practical way.

[Eloel]

Hexblade (Dark Companion)/Binder/Paladin of Slaughter/Blackguard.

There are a couple vestiges that emanate auras. It's something like -8 to all enemy saves, and similar for all other stats. Before hexing. Which is easy with that penalty.
If you want to, you could go with the vestige that makes someone take half the damage on you, instead of one of the auras - their saves suck, so might as well get them to damage themselves.
Fun times

[Starbuck_II]

Bard. Well, if you count singing as an aura.

In fact, a spellcaster that focuses on aura-like spells is fairly able to perform well. Dipping marshal and the like is not particularly synergistic with spellcasting, but in the specific instance of having lots of auras up, collecting the good bits of as many classes as possible is likely the most practical way.

You could homebrew the NWN 2 Bard: he has Inspire Courage as an aura instead of a X/day (calls them inspirations).
They make parties awesome.

[Tyndmyr]

Even more fun, the hexblade aura spells have an odd stacking save system. Basically, you go down the list from highest spell level to lowest. If you fail ANY of them, all saves after that autofail.

In conjunction with the curse, it can be made into a pretty hateful debuff machine, especially given the access to swift action spells to raise a bunch rapidly.

It's probably actually easier to get debuff auras than buff auras, tbh.

[He who is Alway]

Actually that would probably work a lot better. On that idea, would Dread Necro work in there, or would that be something to stay away from?

[ShneekeyTheLost]

Dread Necro is something to finish, not something to dip...

[Keld Denar]

Its not a terrible dip. Charnal Touch + Tome Tainted Soul = infinite OOC healing for you and anyone else who takes TTS. This could save the party a decent amount of money on Wands of Lesser Vigor and stuff like that. Also, IIRC 2 good saves.

Sure, its not the BEST dip, but its hardly a bad dip.

[ShneekeyTheLost]

Its not a terrible dip. Charnal Touch + Tome Tainted Soul = infinite OOC healing for you and anyone else who takes TTS. This could save the party a decent amount of money on Wands of Lesser Vigor and stuff like that. Also, IIRC 2 good saves.

Sure, its not the BEST dip, but its hardly a bad dip.

It requires a feat investment from the entire party, though.

[Tyndmyr]

I wouldn't bother mixing dread necro into the same build.

However, having a dread necro in the same party would be awesome. I've seen a hexblade/DN team that was able to kill some ridiculous stuff due to the wonders of debuffing.

[Psyren]

Dragonfire Adept can pick up Dragonic Auras with feats, and are truly SAD (you only need Con). They have the advantage over Marshal and Dragon Shaman of being an actually good class.

Wisdom 1

There are a couple vestiges that emanate auras. It's something like -8 to all enemy saves, and similar for all other stats. Before hexing. Which is easy with that penalty.
If you want to, you could go with the vestige that makes someone take half the damage on you, instead of one of the auras - their saves suck, so might as well get them to damage themselves.
Fun times

Wisdom 2

I would definitely go Binder or DFA for this concept.
Just whatever you do, stay far, FAR away from Divine Mind...

[He who is Alway]

so you would take paladin of slaughter not tyranny? which would in the long run be more effective you think?

Also who many lvls would you tank into the different classes before you got blackguard? or just take two of each till you qualify?

Ty in advance

[Keld Denar]

Tyranny has Aura of Dispair, Slaughter doesn't. Thats primarily what you are going for. You want the -2 aura.

Do note that Blackguard ALSO has Aura of Dispair. They are two abilities with the same name that don't have an explicit stacking clause, so they shouldn't stack.

If you decide to do it anyway, its pretty much impossible to not qualify as long as you take the right feats when you finish Hexblade4/Pally3.