Well now for flavor

[DareTheRogue]

We are currently in a level 10-16 group and my Favored Soul is so much cheese that the DM is sure to blue bolt him to death, so I picked up some cursed armor in our last session just to see where I could take the game, well our next session is opening with me vs party most likely as the armor is necromantic and evil and the party is ready to have at me. So at event of my death I pushed for more flavor then cheese, or effectiveness, or even usefulness. So I pulled together my Completes, Core and Races of the Wild, and started building just to see what I could put together for fun. My results are this, but I just seem to be missing something.

Halfling Druid 3/Sorcerer 4/Arcane Hierophant 6
First lvl taken from RotW, Halfling Druid, not a fan of the mixed up spontaneous casting but the ride feature from Enhanced Link.
Proceeding with 2 more levels in druid and 4 in sorcerer and then bringin in the PrC Arcane Hierophant.
I am of course pushing my Companion Familiar as much as possible as that is most of the PrC.
So my feats have been Mounted Combat, Mounted Casting, Natural Bond.
I grabbed the Dire Hawk from the back of RotW, with my bonuses applied from both my Druid 9 and Sorcerer 10 levels I have a 9HD Dire Hawk with Flyby Attack, Improved Flight and 2 other feats.
Now for the fun stuff, I have my Dire Hawk, he is my mount. I have a 10th level Sorcerer's spell list and a 9th level Druid's spell list.
The campaign spends a lot of time outdoors making flight on the Dire Hawk plausible but still more fluff then anything cause we still run in to things that would tear me apart while I am in the air. But in a dungeon I still plan on having the duel spell lists, considering we are a ram-shackled party of archers, 2 tanks, one of which has a few cleric levels, and no arcane caster, I will fill the rolls of both hopefully (I realized this after I started building). Now we don't have full casters of either because we do multiple encounters (6-10) per day making spellcasting hard on them because the run out of spells, with both spell lists will I have enough?
And does a multi-classes Halfling riding a Dire Hawk have any chance of being a decent character? I know I won't get level 9 spells in both but possibly in one of two if I do it right, I believe Sorcerer. And should I pick up Practiced Spellcaster for both of the classes and add the CL to both?

Tanks

[Sstoopidtallkid]

You'll want PS, but don't miss the Precocious Apprentice feat. That will let you drop most of your Sorc levels and focus on Druid, which seems to fit this character better. Pick up a level of Beastmaster, too, for the +3 boost on top of Natural Bond. IIRC, the only RSL that's worth it is 5th, but I'm AFB so I can't be sure. I'm suggesting Druid 5/Sorc 1/Beastmaster 1/Arcane Heirophant 9. Druid 5 gets you Wildshape, which you don't with your current build, but if you don't care about that, you can drop a couple levels from there, and use an ACF that trashes Wildshape for something else.

Also, you didn't list Natural Spell. I'm going to assume that was because you considered it obvious, and not because you don't have it.

[DareTheRogue]

Well I wasnt looking at having wild shape so I didnt think of natural spell... but does pecocious apprentice really let you take the PrC that quickly?

[Sstoopidtallkid]

It makes Mystic Theurge viable. Which says a lot. There's some debate, and your DM is likely to ban it completely, but what it does is give you one second level spell and spell slot at first level. Yeah. The creator has come out and said he never even considered that use when he was making it, but that it works by RAW. If you don't want Wildshape, then go variant Druid. It loses Wildshape for a bunch of awesome bonuses, that your DM may rule continue to progress as a Heirophant. That means you can go Druid 3/Sorc 1/Beastmaster 1/Arcane Heirophant 10/Whatever x. I like it.

[DareTheRogue]

Well now that I look at it, to get into Beastmaster need to go Druid 4, Sorcerer 1 then Beastmaster 1 then Arcane Hierophant 10 then something with full divine progression.

[DareTheRogue]

Level Class Feat
1 Halfling Druid 1 (RotW) Skill Focus (Handle Animal)
2 Druid 2
3 Druid 3 Natural Bond
4 Druid 4
5 Sorcerer 1
6 Druid 5 Precocious Apprentice
7 Breastmaster 1
8 Arcane Hierophant 1
9 Arcane Hierophant 2 Natural Spell
10 Arcane Hierophant 3
11 Arcane Hierophant 4
12 Arcane Hierophant 5 Practiced Spellcaster (Druid)
13 Arcane Hierophant 6
14 Arcane Hierophant 7
15 Arcane Hierophant 8
16 Arcane Hierophant 9
17 Arcane Hierophant 10
18 Druid 8
19 Druid 9
20 Druid 10


Lost 2 Druid caster Levels along the way but picked up 11 Sorcerer caster levels. Plus the bonuses to my Companion.

[Sstoopidtallkid]

IIRC, Precocious Apprentece must be take either at first level or your first Arcane Spellcaster level. If someone who had access to their books would like to correct me, I'd enjoy it. AFB is /really/ annoying.

[Admiral Squish]

If you're looking more for flavor than function, I think the first build is absolutely fine for what you want. I assume you're not looking for wildshape, since you are a self-professed cheese-maker, and you know how powerful it is. I will mention that I cannot put words to how awesome it feels to sling spells from the back of some large, flying thing. The bigger the better, though that's probably more an arcane caster thing.

[DareTheRogue]

Yeah Squish I think the first build is fine, and will be fine, but I have to see the cheese of this other build now... I believe cutting wildshape may happen here too. but IDK without wildshape I might go for a bigger flying thing using this build.

[DareTheRogue]

Level Class Feat
1 Halfling Druid 1 Skill Focus (Handle Animal)
2 Druid 2
3 Sorcerer 1 Precocious Apprentice
4 Druid 3
5 Druid 4
6 Breastmaster 1 Natural Bond
7 Arcane Hierophant 1
8 Arcane Hierophant 2
9 Arcane Hierophant 3 Practiced Spellcaster (Sorcerer)
10 Arcane Hierophant 4
11 Arcane Hierophant 5
12 Arcane Hierophant 6 Practiced Spellcaster (Druid)
13 Arcane Hierophant 7
14 Arcane Hierophant 8
15 Arcane Hierophant 9
16 Arcane Hierophant 10
17 Mystic Theurge 1
18 Mystic Theurge 2
19 Mystic Theurge 3
20 Mystic Theurge 4


Keeps Spellcasting going and tops me out with an 18HD companion and 11th level familiar (an extra +6 nat armor and 11 int, and the familiar bonuses). 18th level druid casting and 15 sorcerer.

[DareTheRogue]

So I built using the last post as my level guide, never hitting wildshape, not going to, trying to attain as many CL in both as I can and I came up with at level 13 I have: a 11th level druid spell list (15 CL), a 8th level sorcerer spell list (12 CL), and a 13 HD Dire Hawk who could almost tank for the party.
The feats are as is, giving me the hirer CLs and the bigger Dire Hawk. I know the idea of having a big bear is more effective and all but I am not going for effective, I am going for slinging spells off of a giant airborne animal. So it should be good stuff. Any suggestions for the last 4 levels? Cause I will never be a Mystic Theurge fan, but i want full divine spell progression.

[Kurald Galain]

Well I wasnt looking at having wild shape so I didnt think of natural spell... but does pecocious apprentice really let you take the PrC that quickly?

That depends on whom you ask. It's probably not what the feat was intended for, but the wording can certainly be read so as to support that interpretation. With any luck the WOTC Sage will be answering that some time these weeks.

[Sstoopidtallkid]

That depends on whom you ask. It's probably not what the feat was intended for, but the wording can certainly be read so as to support that interpretation. With any luck the WOTC Sage will be answering that some time these weeks.

Yeah, because he's never been wrong or misinformed. Yeah, Sage is a great resource. He always gives an answer by RAW.

[Solo]

We are currently in a level 10-16 group and my Favored Soul is so much cheese that the DM is sure to blue bolt him to death

Wait, what?

[DareTheRogue]

Blue Bolt: DM kills a PC...

In our game the DM is going to kill me or try to let the party kill me.

I made cheese out of a 14th level Favored Soul, he is more powerful then our two level 16 characters and in the coming fight will probably kill 1 or 2 of them.

[Telonius]

I think Solo's likely more surprised at what must be astonishing levels of cheese to make a Favored Soul powerful enough to merit a blue bolt. (Edit: Particularly if your group contains an arcane caster, or a full cleric - is the rest of your group very un-optimized?) Favored Souls are strong, yeah, but nothing on the level of a Cleric or a Wizard. What exactly did you do? (That'd probably also help us gauge what cheese levels will be acceptable).

[DareTheRogue]

we do not have a full arcane caster or cleric. But my cheese comes in at the fact that my dm let's us use anything he throws at us, even fudged mechanics, such as stacking powerful build and monkey grip and then righteous might to weild a gargantuan great axe. Plus I have the largest access to books and it
gives me a good selection for feats and spells. So I have a Goliath favored soul weilding a gargantuan great axe at times. He out does damage in all aspects and throws out limited control on the field.


We will call it the DMs mistake for trying something and then saying yes we could do it with our characters... of course my goliath will take monkey grip if he can have a Huge Greataxe, then I top it with righteous might... Yeah gargantuan greataxe doing 6d6, plus power attack, divine favor for a BAB and a str of 42... yeah umm can you say the DM just handed it to me and let me run. But on the other hand I control most of the battles too, i bought 4 greater metamagic quicken rods... well there goes the neighborhood...