Wands and Quickdraw? Wand chambers?

[bean illus]

How many wands can one have ready?

How many wand chambers can one carry?

Can i wand chamber a dagger?

[Tohron]

Double Wand Wielder (requires Two Weapon Fighting) lets you dual-file wands with a full round action, and the off-hand wand using two charges. The Rod of Many Wands lets you fire up to three wands at once, with each wand using three charges.

[MaxiDuRaritry]

From here:

The Wand Chamber Fandango
In Dungeonscape you have wand chambers, which can fit into any weapon with a handle or other solid part that's 6 inches long or greater, and that let you hold and wield a wand without having to drop what's in your hand or draw the wand.

In CPsi you have a feat that lets you use a dorje (or wand, since they're equivalent) as a stabbing weapon.

Wands and dorjes are about a foot long each, are the same shape, and are activated the same way, for the same type of purpose.

This means you can have a whole bunch of dorjes and wands that have wand chambers, which means you can wield a dorje inside a dorje inside a dorje inside a dorje inside a dorje inside a dorje etc etc etc.

[Daisy]

Dungeonscape, p33, has the Wand Bracer. It holds five wands, weighs 5lbs and costs 300gp (pretty trivial by the time you need to use that many wands). You can retrieve a wand into your hand as a swift action, so having two of these allows you to effectively have 10 wands readied. However, inserting a wand back into the bracer is a full-found action. As it advises, "Most adventurers just drop the first wand to the ground (a free action) when they need a different one."

I have a Warlock with a bracer with wand chamber for her most commonly-used wand, and a wand bracer for five additional ones.

[bean illus]

Double Wand Wielder (requires Two Weapon Fighting) lets you dual-file wands with a full round action, and the off-hand wand using two charges. The Rod of Many Wands lets you fire up to three wands at once, with each wand using three charges.

Both notable standards.
But my immediate question has more to do with Quick Draw, and that sort of availability.

From here:

The Wand Chamber Fandango
In Dungeonscape you have wand chambers, which can fit into any weapon with a handle or other solid part that's 6 inches long or greater, and that let you hold and wield a wand without having to drop what's in your hand or draw the wand.

In CPsi you have a feat that lets you use a dorje (or wand, since they're equivalent) as a stabbing weapon.

Wands and dorjes are about a foot long each, are the same shape, and are activated the same way, for the same type of purpose.

This means you can have a whole bunch of dorjes and wands that have wand chambers, which means you can wield a dorje inside a dorje inside a dorje inside a dorje inside a dorje inside a dorje etc etc etc.

That sounds a bit too optimized, if know what i mean.

Dungeonscape, p33, has the Wand Bracer. It holds five wands, weighs 5lbs and costs 300gp (pretty trivial by the time you need to use that many wands). You can retrieve a wand into your hand as a swift action, so having two of these allows you to effectively have 10 wands readied. However, inserting a wand back into the bracer is a full-found action. As it advises, "Most adventurers just drop the first wand to the ground (a free action) when they need a different one."

I have a Warlock with a bracer with wand chamber for her most commonly-used wand, and a wand bracer for five additional ones.

Another notable standard, and worth mentioning. I would probably add them to the concept, but they don't fix the problem of needing the swift action. They work good for standard action wands on hold.

* I found this:
FRCS page 95
Bandoleer: "...Leather belt has loops or pouches for carrying small items (up to dagger size)..." "...holds eight items."
FRCS page 96
Bandoleer, Masterwork: "...holds twelve items."

So, i can carry 12 wands and have them on quick draw (free action)? Plus another in the weapon.

How many armor spikes wand chambers would a DM allow to be wielded at once? Would that interfere with wielding the wand in the weapon?

Boot dagger wand chambers?

[AnonJr]

* I found this:
FRCS page 95
Bandoleer: "...Leather belt has loops or pouches for carrying small items (up to dagger size)..." "...holds eight items."
FRCS page 96
Bandoleer, Masterwork: "...holds twelve items."

So, i can carry 12 wands and have them on quick draw (free action)? Plus another in the weapon.

How many armor spikes wand chambers would a DM allow to be wielded at once? Would that interfere with wielding the wand in the weapon?

Boot dagger wand chambers?

A Bandoleer is a great way to get quick access to multiple items, IIRC quick draw should indeed allow you to draw them as a free action. I tend to get one for every wand-using character I build just for that reason. (Well, and the Gishes I make too. It's nice to have ready access to a bunch of throwing weapons early game, and replace a few with wands as you accumulate them.)

As for the wand chambers, it's been my understanding that you still need to be holding the item containing the chamber to activate the wand. So you couldn't use the wand in the chamber of a sheathed dagger, likewise I'm pretty sure armour spikes are out for the same reason. I know the spikes are *technically* weapons, but I'd see most GMs ruling that armour spikes don't fall into the "weapon or shield" requirement.

[loky1109]

How many wands can one have ready?

As many as number of hands you have.

How many wand chambers can one carry?

As many as you can lift up.

Can i wand chamber a dagger?

Yes.

[Crake]

In CPsi you have a feat that lets you use a dorje (or wand, since they're equivalent) as a stabbing weapon.

Just because you can use it as a weapon under very specific circumstances (ie, taking this feat), doesn't mean it is a weapon. You can't put a wand chamber in it.

[MaxiDuRaritry]

Just because you can use it as a weapon under very specific circumstances (ie, taking this feat), doesn't mean it is a weapon. You can't put a wand chamber in it.

It has weapon stats, so it's a weapon. If it wasn't a weapon, it wouldn't be statted as a weapon

[Fizban]

In practice the answer is either "As many as you want" (because as already noted, there are published inexpensive mundane items to let you quickdraw pretty much anything without the feat, and so plenty of char-op games won't even bother thinking about it), or "Exactly the amount the DM says you can" (because the DM has decided the limit on number of hands and thus "wielded" gear and the time it takes to do things is actually important).

Edit: Without anything fancy at all, you can of course have a single wand in either hand. A Buckler allows mostly full use of a hand, which could be holding a wand, and a Small Shield allows you to "hold something" which may or may not be enough to wield a Wand. And as part of the base rules anyone with BAB +1 or greater can draw a weapon as part of a movement action, which ought to extend to any item similarly stowed within easy reach (belt, bandoleer, etc), and could in theory be lawyered by declaring the item an improvised weapon.

I've banned the "Wand Bracer" for being patently ridiculous, Wand Chambers for deliberately violating one hand=one item, and "Masterwork Bandoleer" for blatantly overturning the limits on retrieving items. These effects were all printed for the simple reason that someone decided they didn't like the actual rules, so they made an "item" to break them immediately. (Conversely I've buffed the Quick Draw feat, because that's how you're supposed to Quick Draw.)

I happen to respect and like the tactical implications of the restrictions in the actual rules- the fact that items are *not* perfectly convenient, that you have to *think* about what you can easily equip, how cumbersome it's going to be in action costs vs being able to do the thing yourself, and if you want to get around those you either spend a feat training yourself to do so or a lot of gold pieces on magic items to do it for you.

Consumables and daily items are not nearly as powerful when you have to actually get them out and/or equip them. Letting everyone Quick Draw for free is a free power up. Letting people perfectly distribute and combine their items onto whatever slots they want so everything is always available, is a free power up. Just because such things are published doesn't mean they aren't free power ups- it just means they're Official Power Creep. If you want a game where a "potion" is a button on your hotbar that just happens, there are other games for that. In DnD 3.x you have to take it out of your bag, drink it, and eat some AoOs if you do so in range of an enemy.

Or at least you did before the power creep set in. And to be fair, said power creep is all the way back to early 3.0 books, as mentioned FRCS is where the "Masterwork Bandoleer" is from. But the FR books are also known for their power creep, and a lot of little things can end up reading like house rules from particular games that were simply inducted into the published setting canon- we even have notes in sidebars and articles about some rather massive house rules that Official designers used in their games. So you can always make the (unsubstantiated and unprovable, but possible) claim that X rule might have never actually been followed and it's fine to ignore it for your game.

So again, the answer ought to be "Ask your DM."

How many armor spikes wand chambers would a DM allow to be wielded at once? Would that interfere with wielding the wand in the weapon?

You don't have an armor spike, single. Your armor has a set of armor spikes (which are complete fantasy btw), which all combined are a "weapon" that can be used in grapples or direct attacks. Even if I allowed wand chambers, there's no way you'd get one on an "armor spike," nor a shield spike for that matter. But I did run a character once where my tricked-out shield included a wand chamber in the shield- a heavy shield, though the wand chamber description just says "shield." Even were I allowing wand chambers, I would not allow people to double-dip with a light shield and wand in the hand: the ruling on light shields and wands then becomes a definite no.

Boot dagger wand chambers?

Absolutely not.

The description and pictures provided clearly show the "wand chamber" as essentially a little hollow or ring that physically holds the wand on the weapon so that while holding the weapon you're also holding the wand- something you could have tried to get past a DM without a published item anyway, but given an arbitrary gp cost and published. If the weapon is not held in your hand, with a sufficiently sized and shaped grip to duct tape a wand to, it can't have a wand chamber. And that's explicit in the start of the weapon modification section in the book- it says a solid hilt or handle of at least 6 inches, and most pieces of equipment can only have one. So if the big question is "hey do spikes get around the 'most equipment' and 'hilt or handle' statements," you ask your DM. I laugh and say no.

[rel]

I'd rule as follows:

How many wands can one have ready?

How many wand chambers can one carry?

Can i wand chamber a dagger?

1) 1 per hand

2) an arbitrary number, but taking one off your arm and strapping a new one on would not be possible in combat time

3) sure, a 6 inch handle doesn't seem unreasonable for a large dagger

Both notable standards.
But my immediate question has more to do with Quick Draw, and that sort of availability.

So, i can carry 12 wands and have them on quick draw (free action)? Plus another in the weapon.

How many armor spikes wand chambers would a DM allow to be wielded at once? Would that interfere with wielding the wand in the weapon?

Boot dagger wand chambers?

1) You should be able to have quite a few weapons or wands easily accessible through belts or pouches, but having too much stuff just floating around invites enemies to try sundering.

Note that quick draw explicitly calls out weapons, and for pathfinder the presence of options like mythic quick draw mean that the designers explicitly didn't want anything other than a weapon to be drawn by default.
Many GM's will houserule this, I certainly do, but worth discussing upfront.

Also note there is a rule allowing the GM to limit free actions to whatever's reasonable. I default to 4-5 but I've seen limits as low as 2 free actions per round at some tables.

2) I wouldn't allow armour spikes or boot daggers to carry a wand chamber for the same reason I wouldn't allow a wand tucked behind the characters ear to be used (at least not without special training and a custom feat). I think waving the wand around like Harry Potter is an essential part of getting it to work.
Also armour spikes and boots probably don't have handles in the conventional sense.
For completeness, I'd say you can have one 'armour spikes' weapon per suit of armour should you be trying similar upgrade based shenanigans.

All that said, a lot of GM's simply don't track items in peoples hands very closely. Talk to your GM and you might find they're happy to let you swap your wands around more or less for free.

[YellowJohn]

I was surprised noone had mentioned the Quiver of Ehlonna yet - but now I go back and read it again... I was sure it called out wands...

Oh well. Ask your DM about the Quiver of Ehlonna. I for one consider a wand to be about the same size and shape as an arrow, so it would allow you to have up to 60 available to draw at a moments notice as though drawing a weapon.
Holds up to six staffs too (and staffs are explicitly called out).

Simultaneously both less and more ambiguous, Dragon 291 p.51 has the Bracer of Wands. It's pricey (60K gp, and drains a charge from each wand you add), but it holds three wands each ready to fire normally as though you were holding them. Definitely does what you want it to do, but only if your DM doesn't auto-ban Dragon content.

[MaxiDuRaritry]

If a gauntlet has forearm guards like these do, a wand chamber could easily fit. So one in each gauntlet, and up to three in an elvencraft bow (one in each end of the quarterstaff, and one in the longbow).

[Jervis]

From here:

The Wand Chamber Fandango
In Dungeonscape you have wand chambers, which can fit into any weapon with a handle or other solid part that's 6 inches long or greater, and that let you hold and wield a wand without having to drop what's in your hand or draw the wand.

In CPsi you have a feat that lets you use a dorje (or wand, since they're equivalent) as a stabbing weapon.

Wands and dorjes are about a foot long each, are the same shape, and are activated the same way, for the same type of purpose.

This means you can have a whole bunch of dorjes and wands that have wand chambers, which means you can wield a dorje inside a dorje inside a dorje inside a dorje inside a dorje inside a dorje etc etc etc.

There has to be some stupid use for this. I mean besides infinite wand storage

[Crichton]

However many you end up with using the above suggestions, don't forget to add one more via the Casting Glove from DMG2

Unfortunately due to item/body slot limitations I think you can only benefit from one Casting Glove, so you can't have one for every hand

[AnonJr]

I was surprised noone had mentioned the Quiver of Ehlonna yet - but now I go back and read it again... I was sure it called out wands...

Oh well. Ask your DM about the Quiver of Ehlonna. I for one consider a wand to be about the same size and shape as an arrow, so it would allow you to have up to 60 available to draw at a moments notice as though drawing a weapon.
Holds up to six staffs too (and staffs are explicitly called out).

Good catch, forgot about that. Wands by description aren't too far off from the size/shape of an arrow and could reasonably be argued to fit. Likewise, rods in the "javelin" sized pocket; and as you already mentioned, staves in the large pocket.

We've certainly played it that way at our table, but your mileage may vary based on GM.

[MaxiDuRaritry]

How about having more hands to carry more wands? Being a thri-kreen, binding the Girallon Arms soulmeld, installing a warforged mighty arms graft, casting Girallon's Blessing, having a tailed race (such as kobold) and taking the Prehensile Tail feat...

I'm sure there are more, as well.

[bean illus]

If it wasn't a weapon, it wouldn't be statted as a weapon

This seems patently true. Still, even if allowed, most folk would limit to 1 per weapon (unless you had a master craftsman, who made the entire set! lol)

... base rules anyone with BAB +1 or greater can draw a weapon as part of a movement action, which ought to extend to any item similarly stowed within easy reach (belt, bandoleer, etc), and could in theory be lawyered by declaring the item an improvised weapon.

I'm trying to maintain my swift and move options. Hence Quickdraw.

I've banned the "Wand Bracer" for being patently ridiculous, Wand Chambers for deliberately violating one hand=one item, and "Masterwork Bandoleer" for blatantly overturning the limits on retrieving items. <snip>

I happen to respect and like the tactical implications of the restrictions in the actual rules- <snip> if you want to get around those you either spend a feat training yourself to do so or a lot of gold pieces on magic items to do it for you.

I truly understand, and am on record as having similar ideas.

But, i am spending a feat. And feats are really powerful. By taking quickdraw I'm obviously passing up some pretty powerful options.

Consumables and daily items are not nearly as powerful when you have to actually get them out and/or equip them. Letting everyone Quick Draw for free is a free power up. <snip> take it out of your bag, drink it, and eat some AoOs if you do so in range of an enemy.

Or at least you did before the power creep set in.

Yes. That's one reason we sorted into tiers, and limit source books, etc.

But quickdraw, right? Action economy, right? It's not like a 1 level dip into cloistered for Know Devo, Travel Devo, and Knowledge Domain on factomeleon (yes, that's coming).

Even if I allowed wand chambers, there's no way you'd get one on an "armor spike," nor a shield spike for that matter. But I did run a character once where my tricked-out shield included a wand chamber in the shield- <snip>

Yeah, the wand needs waived around.

I suppose i would allow foot wands if the character has paid a feat or level resource cost (monk?). Feats are expensive. The same character could have built to quicken spell, or god knows what.

The description and pictures provided clearly show the "wand chamber" as essentially a little hollow or ring >snip>

<snip>you ask your DM. I laugh and say no.

I usually ask what resources they spent. For instance TWF, Double Wand Wand Wielder. Otoh, i agree that you can't waive armor spikes around.

I'd rule as follows:

1) 1 per hand

2) an arbitrary number, but taking one off your arm and strapping a new one on would not be possible in combat time

3) sure, a 6 inch handle doesn't seem unreasonable for a large dagger

1) You should be able to have quite a few weapons or wands easily accessible through belts or pouches, but having too much stuff just floating around invites enemies to try sundering.

True, but this particular build can't be sundered. HAHAHA!

It's always worth considering though (sleight oh hand, etc). I intend to keep mostly low level wands in the 'bandoleer'.

Note that quick draw explicitly calls out weapons, and for pathfinder the presence of options like mythic quick draw mean that the designers explicitly didn't want anything other than a weapon to be drawn by default.
Many GM's will houserule this, I certainly do, but worth discussing upfront.

The wands can easily be put in daggers, if they need to be weapons.

Also note there is a rule allowing the GM to limit free actions to whatever's reasonable. I default to 4-5 but I've seen limits as low as 2 free actions per round at some tables.

I'd say one per swift, move or standard action, or 2 per full attack. You are, after all, busy fighting a monster.


2) I wouldn't allow armour spikes or boot daggers to carry a wand chamber for the same reason I wouldn't allow a wand tucked behind the characters ear to be used (at least not without special training and a custom feat). <snip >

For completeness, I'd say you can have one 'armour spikes' weapon per suit of armour should you be trying similar upgrade based shenanigans. [/QUOTE]
I think I'd allow the ear wand feat. Put it in the 'armor spike feat chain', just to see where they go with it (every crazy idea cost feats!).

I was surprised noone had mentioned the Quiver of Ehlonna yet - but now I go back and read it again... I was sure it called out wands...

Yeah, the quiver works. Cheap too.

But, what if i was going to put arrows in the quiver?

Simultaneously both less and more ambiguous, Dragon 291 p.51 has the Bracer of Wands. It's pricey (60K gp, .[/QUOTE]

Yeah, that's high level play, and cost more than 60k. Remember that you have to buy high level wands to use the bracers properly at that level. It's easy to see another +20k going into that.

Even if your campaign called for that, what are you going to do until ... 16th level?

A 'Masterwork Bandoleer' holds 12 daggers, and can be tricked out with 12 wand chambers, and 12 1st level spells @ avg. 10 charges each, for about 2k.

Then put your favorite wand in your weapon

[bean illus]

If a gauntlet has forearm guards like these do, a wand chamber could easily fit. So one in each gauntlet, and up to three in an elvencraft bow (one in each end of the quarterstaff, and one in the longbow).

How about having more hands to carry more wands? Being a thri-kreen, binding the Girallon Arms soulmeld, installing a warforged mighty arms graft, casting Girallon's Blessing, having a tailed race (such as kobold) and taking the Prehensile Tail feat...

I'm sure there are more, as well.

That's the spirit! I'm always amazed at what you come up with.

However many you end up with using the above suggestions, don't forget to add one more via the Casting Glove from DMG2

Unfortunately due to item/body slot limitations I think you can only benefit from one Casting Glove, so you can't have one for every hand

Oh, yeah. Good catch.

[MaxiDuRaritry]

Add wand chambers to a bunch of daggers, along with Quick Draw weapon crystals, from the MIC? Or just add them directly to the wands, if you can.

[arkangel111]

I believe there is either a feat or item that allows warforged to get wand chambers installed on each arm. with 2 staves with wand chambers (double weapons) that lets you wield 6 wands in hands alone. add the wand bracers for 10 more wands, quiver of ehlonna is conservatively 90 more wands. A bandolier is 12 more. you could reasonably carry at least 4 on your belt. and 6 more in a trench coat. 1 in each boot at least for a grand total of 130 wands before even altering your character with prehensile tails, grafts or dipping into shenanigans like getting 50 sizing morphing +1 wand chambered shuriken's.

I think your limiting factor is going to be WBL and how much you really wish to dedicate to this, long before you reach a physical limit. With portable holes, and bags of holding you can get these numbers to astronomical numbers, your going to be running out of spells to put in wands. Clearly this character needs to be an artificer, but after that even warforged is optional.

[Darg]

How about having more hands to carry more wands? Being a thri-kreen, binding the Girallon Arms soulmeld, installing a warforged mighty arms graft, casting Girallon's Blessing, having a tailed race (such as kobold) and taking the Prehensile Tail feat...

I'm sure there are more, as well.

In the same vein, there is a soulmeld that gives you a tail. No need to be a race with a tail.

[Jervis]

I’ve officially found a use for wands within wands within wands using the wand with wand chambers nonsense.

Step 1: party finds a wand with a wand chamber, the wand has few or no charges remaining

Step 2: they open it to find another wand with a wand chambers and few or no charges remaining

Step 3: Repeat steps 1 and 2 N times

Step 4: After N wand chambers openings they get to the last wand, which has a Disjunction spell trap set to go off when the chamber has been opened

Step 5:…?

Step 6: Profit

[bean illus]

I believe there is either a feat or item that allows warforged to get wand chambers installed on each arm. with 2 staves with wand chambers (double weapons) that lets you wield 6 wands in hands alone. add the wand bracers for 10 more wands, quiver of ehlonna is conservatively 90 more wands. A bandolier is 12 more. you could reasonably carry at least 4 on your belt. and 6 more in a trench coat. 1 in each boot at least for a grand total of 130 wands before even altering your character with prehensile tails, grafts or dipping into shenanigans like getting 50 sizing morphing +1 wand chambered shuriken's.

I think your limiting factor is going to be WBL ...

Well, i already said that i was reserving the quiver for arrows, but ...

I think one can specialize in craft, and pay only like 30%. At that point 1st level spells are less than 2gp. So, at least in theory one could carry MANY partially charged wands.

But that's not what i intend. Just a dozen or so, plus the weapon wand (and the glove wand?).

Add wand chambers to a bunch of daggers, along with Quick Draw weapon crystals, from the MIC? Or just add them directly to the wands, if you can.

Hmmm, ... . 12 dagger wands with crystals?

I’ve officially found a use for wands within wands within wands using the wand with wand chambers nonsense.

Step 1: party finds a wand with a wand chamber, the wand has few or no charges remaining
Step 2: they open it to find another wand with a wand chambers and few or no charges remaining
Step 3: Repeat steps 1 and 2 N times
Step 4: After N wand chambers openings they get to the last wand, which has a Disjunction spell trap set to go off when the chamber has been opened
Step 5:…?
Step 6: Profit

Lol, no.

[Crake]

It has weapon stats, so it's a weapon. If it wasn't a weapon, it wouldn't be statted as a weapon

Improvised weapons also have weapon stats, doesn't mean they're actually weapons, even though there are feats and class abilities that allow you to wield improvised weapons without penalty, which is effectively what the feat you mentioned does.

[rel]

Add wand chambers to a bunch of daggers, along with Quick Draw weapon crystals, from the MIC? Or just add them directly to the wands, if you can.

That's a very good approach.
Obviously in line with the rules as written and the rules as intended, no weird edge cases, easily expandable and its costly and builds up slowly so the GM is unlikely to drop the ban hammer.