Adventuring in Undermountain, anyone?

[General Havoc]

So... CT was just telling me about a crazy class from some supplement book called a "Favored Soul", which is some absurd cleric with sorcerer rules applied. I'm looking into it.

Apparently at high levels, you get wings.

Like... angel wings.

[Rogue 9]

Favored soul is actually less absurd than cleric, though you wouldn't know it from looking at the class chart.

[B4UTRUST]

Lets face it, thanks to the thousand and one books by WotC or anyone willing to fork over the cash to slap a D20 approved stamp on their book there is a PrC for every base class that somehow breaks all rules of common sense and generally makes it a pain in the ass.

So, Rogue, do you have enough openings left or should I just hit the door?

[General Havoc]

Yeah, on second thought, I'm gonna stick with a cleric. Might re-arange the feats a bit though. Some of those divine metamagic things look nice.

[Jason_Firewalker]

I admit defeat about the Speak Lang issue.

Secondly, I will change my race to Sun Elf. Same stat adjusts if I am not mistaken, otherwise message me and inform me of thus as I do not own Races of Faerun or the main Faerun Players Handbook, having had both of them heebed with my old game group.

[Jason_Firewalker]

Oh and Havoc, you might consider staying cleric 'cause Favored Souls cannot turn undead or get the nifty domain thingies. So therefore most divine feats would not work for you.

[Rogue 9]

Lets face it, thanks to the thousand and one books by WotC or anyone willing to fork over the cash to slap a D20 approved stamp on their book there is a PrC for every base class that somehow breaks all rules of common sense and generally makes it a pain in the ass.

So, Rogue, do you have enough openings left or should I just hit the door?

I don't know; I haven't managed to get a headcount yet.

Edit: Actually, come to think of it? Yes, you're in. Last time a campaign crashed, the number of players was with three times the limit I originally set for this one, and it still went on for some months before dying. I can hack it with seven or eight, and there aren't many more players than that on this board.

[General Havoc]

Oh and Havoc, you might consider staying cleric 'cause Favored Souls cannot turn undead or get the nifty domain thingies. So therefore most divine feats would not work for you.

The information I had seemed to indicate that they could indeed turn undead and so on just like a standard cleric, but whether or not that's the case, my understanding was that, even moreso than a wizard, a cleric lives and dies by the massive breadth of the spells available to him. With only a relative handful of spells to pick from, and no capacity to spontaneously convert them into healing spells as needed (thus forcing me to waste valuable spell selections on the cure spells), there is just no way I'd be able to get everything that would be expected of a cleric between buff, debuff, counter-debuff, and healing spells, to say nothing of the occasional flamboyant direct damage spell.

I mean who can resist Flame Strike?

EDIT: Okay... I'm looking back over the various feats from Complete Divine... am I mis-reading something, or are the Divine Metamagic feats, especially Quicken Spell absolutely obscene?

According to my reading, if I took that feat, I would gain the ability to spend four turning attempts to turn any spell I like into the equivalent of an instant action (or whatever the relevant term is). The feat explicitly states that I could do this to a spell and then cast another spell normally in the same round and that as I am spending turning attempts to do this, I can do it to any spell I want without even taking up a slot from a higher level.

Is that honestly not as powerful as I think it is? Am I missing something obvious, because as it stands I'm not seeing any reason why I would grab that feat along with the one that gives more turning attempts per day and simply sling magic about like its going out of style. I could counteract an enemy's debuff spell, and debuff him at the same time. I could dispell an enemy wizard's protection spells and then nuke him with a nasty debuff or a direct damage strike all in the same round.

Seriously, what am I missing here?

[rhoenix]

Alright, I'm narrowing this down as best I can, but I post this now to get some advice. That is assuming of course that there is still room for another player.

Choice #1: Monk (PHB)
Feats/Build: Combat Focus (PHB2), Combat Vigor (PHB2), Combat Strike (PHB2), Fiery Fists (PHB2), Ki Strike (PHB2), Versatile Unarmed Strike (PHB2), Weapon Focus: Unarmed (PHB)
Notes: Monks have always held a special place in my heart. My last one was a Lawful Good half-demon (using the half-demon template from the DMG), but even he would be very well-served by the above Feats. This would be a good balanced character I think, unless I've missed something.

Choice #2: Duskblade (PHB2)
Feats/Build: Will be built primarily with a fighter's feats; essentially treated as a Fighter who can cast some arcane spells.
Weapon: Greatsword
Notes: As I told Rogue9, I really, really miss the spell Blindness/Deafness, as nearly every fighter/mage I ever made had that spell. On the other hand, the Duskblade has some unique and useful spells to almost make up for it in quantity. I'd play this character more like a Tank/Assassin, as his feats would be geared toward eliminating single targets.

There are my brief notes on the subject - any and all thoughts, suggestions, and critiques are appreciated.

[Comrade Tortoise]

I admit defeat about the Speak Lang issue.

Secondly, I will change my race to Sun Elf. Same stat adjusts if I am not mistaken, otherwise message me and inform me of thus as I do not own Races of Faerun or the main Faerun Players Handbook, having had both of them heebed with my old game group.

Heebed?

But the racial adjusts are not the same. They are +2 Int, -2 con. You do not get the dex adjustment, or the strength neg.

[Cynical Cat]

There' significant cultural differences as well. Sun elves tend to be much bigger dicks than grey elves.

[LadyTevar]

There' significant cultural differences as well. Sun elves tend to be much bigger dicks than grey elves.

That's the understatement of the decade..... a more stuck-up, self-righteous batch of inbred know-it-alls can never be found.

Rheonix? Play the Duskblade :)

[Comrade Tortoise]

There' significant cultural differences as well. Sun elves tend to be much bigger dicks than grey elves.

That's the understatement of the decade..... a more stuck-up, self-righteous batch of inbred know-it-alls can never be found.

Rheonix? Play the Duskblade :)

It is very very true. Of course from what little I remember of grey elves they are not much better. For some odd reason Int bonuses mean you are a douche. Either that or crazy (see 2nd edition gnomes)

[rhoenix]

Rhoenix? Play the Duskblade :)

Perhaps I just need to make a pro/con chart for both. Bah.

Monk:
=====
+ No need for armor. Dex & Wis both add to armor class.
+ No need for weapons after level 2 - Monk to-hit and hand damage is awesome.
+ Monk abilities are badass all around.
+ With the feat Ki Blast, Monks can hit targets 60 feet away for the price of a Stun charge.
+ With Fiery Fists, Monks can add fire damage to unarmed attacks for the price of a Stun charge.
- Can't wear any armor or be more than lightly encumbered to fight effectively.
- No spells.
- Heavily restricted in terms of useful magical items.

Duskblade:
=======
+ Weapons selection is just as broad as a fighter's.
+ They begin wearing Light armor, and progress up to Medium and still have a minimal arcane spell failure chance.
+ They get their own special spells.
+ They also apparently get a Familiar.
+ With the right Feats & Spells, Duskblades are amazing at single-target elimination.
+ They cast spells as Sorcerors do, which means they don't need to follow the memorization rules.
- Despite being essentially Fighter/Mages, they're terrible at causing AoE damage, with one exception - most of their spells are single-target.
- They don't have Blindness/Deafness allowed for their 2nd level spells. This still makes me sad.
- The weapons and armor they wear make them much more equipment-dependent to be useful than the Monk.
- Their versatility makes selecting the proper Feats difficult.

====================
Alright, so with this list it looks as if the Duskblade is winning.

Well, with that in mind, what are everyone's opinions of the Combat Focus/Stance feats of the Player's Handbook 2? The main feat Combat Focus isn't all that impressive, but having Combat Vigor and another one (for a total of three) allow a character to heal 2hp/round while active, and allows a devastating attack from Combat Strike. These feats I had picked out for the Monk, but they seem useful for the Duskblade as well.

Any other Feat suggestions are welcome too.

[LadyTevar]

Remember you're just 1st level, hon. You only get so many starting feats.

[rhoenix]

Remember you're just 1st level, hon. You only get so many starting feats.

True, but it never hurts to plan ahead. Particularly in this game.

[SirNitram]

Divine Metamagic is the only contender to knock Druids off their absolute pinnacle of power.

Divine Metamagic + Persistant Spell + Divine Power: Your cleric now is a full-caster with full BAB and iterative attacks.

This is without the Miracle At Level 6 trick.

[General Havoc]

Divine Metamagic is the only contender to knock Druids off their absolute pinnacle of power.

Divine Metamagic + Persistant Spell + Divine Power: Your cleric now is a full-caster with full BAB and iterative attacks.

This is without the Miracle At Level 6 trick.

Nit, I'm sorry, I'm gonna need that translated into english. :)

What is BAB and iterative attacks? For that matter, what is Divine Power?

[Rogue 9]

BAB is your base attack bonus. Iterative attacks are the attacks you get after the first for having high BAB; every time your base attack bonus passes an increment of five, you get another attack. Divine power is a cleric spell that gives the caster BAB equal to his character level, +6 to Strength, and 1 temporary hit point per Hit Die.

[General Havoc]

Holy SHIT, I just looked up Divine Power... You gain your caster level as your base attack bonus, and a +6 bonus to strength?

And with Persistant, you get this for 24 hours?!

AND you still get to cast as a cleric?

...

Um...

[Rogue 9]

You do that, and I will make sure one of the baddies has dispel magic handy. Just sayin'.

[General Havoc]

You do that, and I will make sure one of the baddies has dispel magic handy. Just sayin'.

Then I may need to ask Nit about his Miracle-at-level-6 trick...

[Cynical Cat]

It is very very true. Of course from what little I remember of grey elves they are not much better. For some odd reason Int bonuses mean you are a douche. Either that or crazy (see 2nd edition gnomes)

Duskblades rock. Grey elves do tend to be haughty because they are wise, skilled, and reclusive; but they aren't (generally) dicks. Sun elves literally believe they're chosen by god (Corellion Lorethion to be precise) to be the uber-elves and leaders of all elves. They tend to be very touchy when anyone brings up their past fuck ups, especially their colossally bad ones (creation of the drow anyone?), which might indicate that they aren't so fucking perfect.

[SirNitram]

Miracle At Level 6 is an abuse of Height Spell, Divine Metamagic, and some interesting toys that fiddle with both.

Take a Generi-Cleric, give him the Undeath Domain. This grants him one free Extra Turning feat. As a human, take Heighten Spell and Earth Spell. At 3rd level, take Divine Metamagic.

When about to train for 6th level, pump a spell to level 9 via Divine Metamagicing Heighten Spell. Earth Spell makes it a 10th level spell. Take the Extra Spell feat as you train level 6, specificying a slot one less than your highest availiable.. Which was artificially inflated to 10. 9th level slot. Nature of Divine casting now says you have access to all level 9 spells.

It relies on the idea that Heighten Spell can be used in this way, which caused some consteration at the time.

(There's a worse version, but I shan't show it for fear of pitchforks.)

[Jason_Firewalker]

Havoc, let me lay out the pros and cons of Favored Souls vs Clerics

Favored Soul:
P: Can Cast a butt load of spells per day
C: Gets higher level spells slower
C: Knows fewer spells
C: Lacks turning
P: Gets energy resists
P: Gets wings
P: Gets Damage reduction (20th level)
P: Spontaneous Caster
P: Gets nifty weapon things with deity's favored weapon

Cleric:
C: Not as much weapony things
C: Fewer spells per day
P: Almost infinite spell list
P: Gets higher level spells faster (Can we say Flame Strike)
P: Turn undead (Which powers all the divine feats from Complete Divine and are really fucking nifty)
P: Gets to spontaneously drop their prepared spells for cures or inflicts based upon alignment (Tyr cures)