Vestige Metamagic -Cheese for Wizards

[Armar]

Okay, I happened to be reading Tome of Magic when I came across an interesting PrC; Anima Mage. Basically it's a PrC that requires you to be nongood, have 4 ranks in Intimidate & Knowledge (Planes), any metamagic feat and the ability to cast 2nd-level arcane spells and bind 2nd-level vestiges. I read the class abilities, and my head went 'Click'. At level 5 you get the ability to suppress your vestige abilities for 5 turns, 1/day, to apply ANY metamagic you know to any spell you cast WITHOUT increasing its level. At level 7 you get it 2/day, and at level 9 3/day.

And what's best is that Anima Mage gives you full caster progression, and with the help of Bind Vestige and Improved Bind Vestige -feats (Allows non-binder to bind one vestige with max level of 3 with the Improved version) you can go in with pure wizard.

Now, about that 'Vestige Metamagic' ability... Persistent Spell anyone? Not so powerful at lower levels, but higher levels.... let's just say: 24 hour Shapechange, Foresight and Superior Invisibility (from Spell Compendum), and your wizard has the cruise control for awesome.

EDIT: Just remembered that Persist Spell only requires the spell to have 'Personal or fixed range'. Guess what spell that we all love so much has range: Personal, and duration: 1d4+1 turns? Hint: it starts with 'T', and the last word is 'Stop'

[Fenix_of_Doom]

EDIT: Just remembered that Persist Spell only requires the spell to have 'Personal or fixed range'. Guess what spell that we all love so much has range: Personal, and duration: 1d4+1 turns? Hint: it starts with 'T', and the last word is 'Stop'

fortunately, time stop has a duratian of "instantaneous", so I don't think it could be persisted, which is a good thing, otherwise you'd be entrapped forever in a space in which only you can move and you can't harm anyone, it would propebly end when you died so it would be instakilling yourself.

about anima mage, I've only heard about it but I got the impression it was more like a not bad but definitely no cheese prc.

[Arbitrarity]

As I recall, the "instantaneous" duration of time stop is eratta of some sort.

Duration: 1d4+1 rounds

That's a duration, right there.

[Armar]

fortunately, time stop has a duratian of "instantaneous", so I don't think it could be persisted, which is a good thing, otherwise you'd be entrapped forever in a space in which only you can move and you can't harm anyone, it would propebly end when you died so it would be instakilling yourself.

Read the description again, at least my book says 'Duration: 1d4+1 rounds (apparent time)', as does the SRD. And Persistent Spell only extends the duration of the spell to 24 hours.

EDIT: Ninja'd

[lord_khaine]

it has been said on either the errata or the FAQ that timestop cant be persistet.

[Arbitrarity]

Ah, I think it was FAQ. Which isn't official, nor errata, so it's not necessary for RAW

Yes, it is FAQ. Stealth errata (ignores for munchkinry)

[Fenix_of_Doom]

Read the description again, at least my book says 'Duration: 1d4+1 rounds (apparent time)', as does the SRD. And Persistent Spell only extends the duration of the spell to 24 hours.

EDIT: Ninja'd

24 hours in time stopped time or real time? If it's 24 hours in real time you could well have died from old age by the time the 24 hours end.

still I did mix up Persistent Spell and Permanency, silly me.

[Armar]

Well, I looked through the PHB errata and the recent FAQ, and didn't find anything on persisting Time Stop, so if you know where it was mentioned, post the source.

24 hours in time stopped time or real time? If it's 24 hours in real time you could well have died from old age by the time the 24 hours end.

Well, just like Sudden Maximizing Time Stop, it's the time you have in the Time Stop that is affected. This also opens up an interesting possibility: picking up a race that does not die of old age (Elan for example), and spending the time you have in Persistent Time Stop to replenish your spells and vestige, then just cast it again when it ends. This would give you basically an eternity in an eyeblink.

And if I have time, I think I might try to do a cheesy wizard build comibining Anima Mage, Initiate of the Sevenfold Cheese and Archmage, just for the sake of it.

[Arbitrarity]

MainFAQv06272003. It's ancient, from 3.0, but it mentions time stop as having an instantaneous duration "for the purposes of the persistant spell feat".

[Armar]

MainFAQv06272003. It's ancient, from 3.0, but it mentions time stop as having an instantaneous duration "for the purposes of the persistant spell feat".

Curses, foiled again! Well, you can't have everything always. But with persisted Foresight, Shapechange and Superior Invisibility, you're pretty much safe. Actually, can anyone think of a way how this wizard could even be defeated? (If we are assuming that he's an Elan or something that doesn't die of old age.)

[Nebo_]

People have been using this trick for a long, long time. You're a little behind - but good catch anyway.

[Jack_Simth]

Curses, foiled again! Well, you can't have everything always. But with persisted Foresight, Shapechange and Superior Invisibility, you're pretty much safe. Actually, can anyone think of a way how this wizard could even be defeated? (If we are assuming that he's an Elan or something that doesn't die of old age.)

Well, I'm not particularly up on Superior Invisibility, but how about locating by way of True Sight, Disjunction to get rid of the annoying spells, followed by something rod-Quickened in a nice flavor of Fort save or lose/die?

[Draz74]

And what's best is that Anima Mage gives you full caster progression, and with the help of Bind Vestige and Improved Bind Vestige -feats (Allows non-binder to bind one vestige with max level of 3 with the Improved version) you can go in with pure wizard.

I'm away from my Tome of Magic, but I seem to remember that there was some reason the Bind Vestige feat didn't work. Maybe the prereqs actually list the name of the Binder's class ability? Improved Bind Vestige still works. So if I'm remembering right, you can actually get into Anima Mage with a one-level Binder dip.

Still very cheesy PrC, especially with Persist; no argument there.

[kemmotar]

hmmm...clericzilla wizard...pas mal!!
You could also use split ray with enervation and then rod quicken it once more...

Just a question, does this last for 5 rounds? So can you cast spells powered by one metamagic for free?