Why you should never trust a caster with a high AC...

[Apophis775]

So, We were playing the Red Hand of Doom campaign. I am an assassin, and My friend is a wizard. We joined mid-campaign, and because of this, threw a quick back-story together. We had met after i assassinated his brother to join the assassins guild. It hadn't been a problem because, it turns out, his brother was evil. Anyway, all throughout the campaign shenanigans are happening to me. I was scouting ahead and ran into wire strung between trees, he told the party he thought i was stealing from the cart (which resulted in me not being able to embezzle as much out of our loot sales). Also, we had taken a goblin prisoner and he "escaped" in the middle of the night.

Anyway, Being an assassin and a rogue in love with money, I plotted with him to kill a wizard. He would take the wizards spell-book and I would raid the shop. However, someone tipped the guards off and they were waiting, so I wasn't able to accomplish my murder (it had been ingeniously thought as well, I would have him cast anti-magic field, and then assassinate-skill to the face 18 seconds later).

I was a bit suspicious of this at this point, but considering that i had made a deal with him to split my embezzlement, i wasn't really suspecting him.

It wasn't until we brought a map we had found to the guards that I was even more suspicious. The guards unfolded it, and one of the fighters near me noticed some ruins on the back. Now, we had been talking about explosive ruins shortly before that, and the wizard was learning a spell with his share of the loot from a local wizard. Well, as soon as we noticed the ruins I yelled "NO" and our fighter READ THEM ALOUD. Causing them to explode and kill the guard holding the map as well as injuring the fighter. Luckily, evasion is amazing and I matrix-dodged my way through space-time and avoided all damage.

We immediately ran back to to the wizard (who had been holding the map before giving it to us to bring to the guards). We told him what happened, and lightly brushed it off as a goblin trap. Until i started piecing things together. I attempted to convince the group that the wizard was the culprit, but failed miserably. However, the fighter was also putting two and two together, and he convinced the group. We confronted the wizard and he said 3 words: "I cast web" . He locked us in place, backed up a step and waited for our checks to get out of the web. On his next turn, he drank a pre-prepared potion of fly and flew out the door yelling curses at us.

Shortly after, we found out that he actually HAD taken the death of his brother seriously. He had plotted to kill me AND the healer. Also, if he had time, there would have been additional sabotage to the city before his escape allowing it to fall easily. He was communicating with goblins using dead-drops and we all just failed miserably at spotting them.

Now, one of the things we found out was that he had a high AC (for a wizard). You see, he's an expert at pulling additions to AC almost literally out of his ass (he reads lots of source-books). In a previous campaign, he was the cleric who somehow ended up being both a tank and top DPS for the campaign.


So, tl;dr NEVER TRUST A WIZARD WITH A HIGH AC. Especially if you had previously killed his brother.

[Lycar]

... I'd strongly advise your Assassin to go grow a Sense Motive.

Apart from that, congratulations on having had an awesome game. Now I'm jealous.

So it seems like you've got a nemesis to hunt down for your character. Any plans on how to do this? Wizards are so notoriously hard to hunt down and kill after all.

Lycar

[Popertop]

a better strategy would be to never trust a wizard period.

[Apophis775]

Yes, coincidentally, only a slight modification of my original plan.

Raise an army, defend the locals, defeat the goblins, seize control of the kingdom with said army, and then hunt the wizard to the ends of the earth.

[Escheton]

Yes, coincidentally, only a slight modification of my original plan.

Raise an army, defend the locals, defeat the goblins, seize control of the kingdom with said army, and then hunt the wizard to the ends of the earth.

Why? You killed his brother, he will probably be doing the hunting now that covert ops isnt working any more.

Good luck on that btw.

[Greenish]

It wasn't until we brought a map we had found to the guards that I was even more suspicious. The guards unfolded it, and one of the fighters near me noticed some ruins on the back. Now, we had been talking about explosive ruins shortly before that, and the wizard was learning a spell with his share of the loot from a local wizard. Well, as soon as we noticed the ruins I yelled "NO" and our fighter READ THEM ALOUD.

Took me a moment to figure out what's the problem with some ruins on a map.

[KillianHawkeye]

Man, my next adventure is going to have to be at some explosive ruins!

[Escheton]

Don't forget, good guys don't look at explosions, they blow **** up and walk away.

[VacantPsalm]

What kind of mean person would do that?.....



.....

Spoiler

Show

Oh yea, me.

Anywho, you forgot to mention I wasn't a wizard... I was a MYSTIC THURGE WHO USED PRECOCIOUS (fixed!) APPRENTICE TO GET IN EARLY! Muahahaha! Ah, I'm gonna have to talk to our DM to make sure he knows how to lvl that character.

PS: I'm re-rolling as a Wizard gnome with lots of AC. :D

[Claudius Maximus]

So what method(s) were used to generate this high AC?

Sorry, but I've constructed some high-AC stuff in the past and I'm curious as to what the wizard was using.

[Greenish]

So what method(s) were used to generate this high AC?

I think it's fair to assume that Luminous Armour didn't feature.

[Flickerdart]

Man, my next adventure is going to have to be at some explosive ruins!

Explosive Ruins could be a great encounter. Rogue detects traps? "Yes, there are traps." Watch as he tries to disarm the entire ruin.

[VacantPsalm]

So what method(s) were used to generate this high AC?

Sorry, but I've constructed some high-AC stuff in the past and I'm curious as to what the wizard was using.

Actually, this character didn't have uber high AC, only 16.

However, a previous MT I had used a monk's belt to get Wis to AC, that plus Mage armor plus high dex gave me a base of 20 or 22 or something and I had a shield spell ready.... I'm forgetting something, I know that I had it at 28 and the fighter was only like 19 so I had to step up and tank a bit. (or maybe that was my vow of poverty Druid. Hm.)

For this gnome, I'm probably going to grab a mithril buckler. So, mage arm + gnome + dex + mithril buckler would be around 18 base and then a backup shield would make me have 22. Not über, but more then most people in out campaign. Really, "getting AC out of my ass" means I know how to set things up to where I get close to 20 and that's only awesome in comparison to the rest of our group.

[tyckspoon]

-ac stuff-

tl;dr: This group is bad at AC.

Seriously, 20 is easy. Pretty much any character that makes half an effort at it should be able to get 19-20 AC, especially at a high enough level to be a Mystic Theurge (even with early entry, you're talking level 4-5.) Wear armor: 14-15 base, depending on if you're a Chain Shirt or Breastplate kinda person. Dex: 2-3 for a large number of builds, so you're at 17. Carry a shield if you're really concerned about it: 18 or 19, depending on Light/Heavy. +1 AC item: 19/20. Congratulations. Bump up the numbers 4 points if you wear full plate instead, which you can afford to do by WBL at about level 4 also.

[Claudius Maximus]

Oh, so it's reasonable stuff like that. I got the impression you were getting obnoxious AC from weird sources. Probably better that you're not if nobody else is really optimizing.

Anyway, sounds like you all had fun with these schemes. I sometimes wish some of my players had the motivation for this sort of thing.

[VacantPsalm]

Yea, we're still relatively new to D&D and I happen to be the rules lawyer who looks through all the books. There are times when I try to get a bit crazy (1 ranger + 2 monk + 1 lion totem bar + rest ranger with Ascetic Hunter feat = two handed sword plus kicks so I have two weapon fighting AND two handed fighting plus pounce so I get full attack on charge. Lol SOB Ranger) but they shoot it down before I get a chance... Either that or they just let me play my clerics. I'm one of those people who prefers to do many things and mainly heal. (grabbing UMD with this Wiz so I can use wands of healz.)

[Flickerdart]

Yea, we're still relatively new to D&D and I happen to be the rules lawyer who looks through all the books. There are times when I try to get a bit crazy (1 ranger + 2 monk + 1 lion totem bar + rest ranger with Ascetic Hunter feat = two handed sword plus kicks so I have two weapon fighting AND two handed fighting plus pounce so I get full attack on charge. Lol SOB Ranger) but they shoot it down before I get a chance... Either that or they just let me play my clerics. I'm one of those people who prefers to do many things and mainly heal. (grabbing UMD with this Wiz so I can use wands of healz.)

Except that you only get the regular TWF - you're not using a Monk weapon so you cannot Flurry.

[Greenish]

I have two weapon fighting AND two handed fighting

I prefer Revenant Blade for that. Pounce, Travel Devotion, HiPS - Charge, retreat, hide, repeat.

[Weasel of Doom]

They thought your TWF ranger etc was too powerful so got you to play a cleric?

[Jack_Simth]

They thought your TWF ranger etc was too powerful so got you to play a cleric?

Every group has different optimization standards, and *not* everyone knows how to play a Cleric to it's strengths. If you have someone playing a traditional heal-bot cleric, they're not going to dominate.

[Saveducks]

My friend played a scout rogue and was able to hit 43 ac by level 8 as long as he moved 20 feet.

[tyckspoon]

Every group has different optimization standards, and *not* everyone knows how to play a Cleric to it's strengths. If you have someone playing a traditional heal-bot cleric, they're not going to dominate.

You can get away with quite a lot if your group still only thinks of you as 'guy who does the heals."

[Greenish]

You can get away with quite a lot if your group still only thinks of you as 'guy who does the heals."

Indeed.

In a previous campaign, he was the cleric who somehow ended up being both a tank and top DPS for the campaign.

[Popertop]

They thought your TWF ranger etc was too powerful so got you to play a cleric?

yeah, my group did this too :/

[VacantPsalm]

They thought your TWF ranger etc was too powerful so got you to play a cleric?

No, I ended up going scout / ranger and am heading for order of the bow initiate. I was going to be a cleric but my DM was like, "you're always a Cleric, I want you to play something different."

[Greenish]

am heading for order of the bow initiate.

[Tael]

@Greenish
I sure hope he understands.

Also, show your group the tier system, and give them handbooks for their classes. Just google "xxxxx handbook" or look on BG.

Might make the characters a bit more even.

[Gabe the Bard]

Part of me wishes we could have such scheming in our gaming group, but our barbarian would probably squish the schemer and tell him to come back with a friendlier character.

[Fenryr]

Awesome adventure so far. At least the Fighter was smart enough to help ya. So, how's going the new plan?

No, I ended up going scout / ranger and am heading for order of the bow initiate.

Greenish already pointed the obvious. Don't ever look at that class again. Unless your DM allows some kind of fix or the 3.0 version, don't try it. I ... fell in the same trap long time ago. 'm ashamed. I still cry some nights.

[VacantPsalm]

http://blog.zap2it.com/pop2it/admiral-ackbar-ole-miss-bigger.jpg

All I want is the shooting without taking AoE, the rest would be ranger lvls. As usual, my AC is rather high so I want to be able to jump in at any second and tank while still using my bow. I know it's not optimal, but I prefer flexibility to raw power. (As you could probably tell with me using MT.)