60th Level Character Optimization [3.x]

[TeslaJr]

So, my DM asked the party to make the most powerful 60th level non-spellcasting characters we can. I don't mess around with non-spellcasters that often, so I'm not that great at optimizing them. I've also never been past 30th level, so I'm a little overwhelmed. The only thing not allowed is spellcasting of any kind (no wizards, psions, psychic warriors, clerics, druids, binders, tainted sorcerers, planar shepherds, etc).

I'm gonna start off with a level in Spirit Totem Barbarian to get Pounce, then move into Warblade (for maneuvers) and/or Fighter (for feats). If/When I do go into Fighter, I'm definitely picking up the Dungeoncrasher ACF and the Knockback feat. The character will be focused on maximizing PAttack and Trip, so at some point I'm going to pick up 10 levels of Frenzied Berserker and Improved Trip, Knock-down, Leap Attack, and maybe Shock Trooper and Battle Jump. After Epic, I'll probably get the full War Hulk progression for the +20 to Str and Massive Swing. I think I'll also pick up a few levels of Drunken Master for the Stagger ability.

For my weapon, I'm definitely picking up something with reach and slapping Valorous on it. Probably a Spiked Chain, but if there are any better reach weapons out there I'll switch.

[Vhaidara]

War Hulk, FB, and, with 60 levels, you might even be able to finagle in Cavalier and do all of this in a mounted charge that raises your multiplier by another 4.

[Rubik]

Changeling master of many forms into illithid savant, then build your own class from the class and racial features of others. Make sure you eat a hagunemnon for their shapeshifting, and an aleax of an earlier version of yourself for Ex Shapechange.

[Kazyan]

First, clarify how much WBL you have, since the ELH doesn't provide numbers for above 40th level. Regressing a curve to the wonky pattern suggests that you get about 98,500,000 gp. That is going to massively impact what you do.

[Naanomi]

Centaur, templated with any template that gives more than 2 STR for each LA; with Warblade 1/Hulking Hurler 3/Master Thrower 1/Bloodstorm Blade 10/Warhulk (The Rest)

Throw planets, hitting everyone in line of sight (and everyone stupid enough to stand next to someone else twice)

[Phelix-Mu]

I'd go for a smite build, one with a more generalized smite or something. Great Smite epic feat is pretty stupid, and you should have enough iterations of Extra Smite to smote the smitten until they can't take any more smiting. With 60 levels, you should be able to cram in some useful stuff into a non-spellcasting paladin core and then take it in the direction of Grey Guard or Fist of Raziel or something to get more smiting and chain smiting. Add in a bit of Hellreaver from Fiendish Codex II.

You may also want to decide if your silly level would have allowed you to pay an epic spellcaster to caste epic spells on you. Normally, that is just a very silly thing to consider. But level 60 is very silly, so a little more very silly is unlikely to matter.

Basically, I'd go for a Turn Undead/Divine Feat and focus on Smiting, and probably toss a bit of barbarian or some form of rage-esque in there. Or, perhaps a touch of sneak attack, lol. In sixty levels, you could jam a whole lot of class features in there.

And you could buy every other feature you couldn't fit. 98 million. Hehe. You better get a spreadsheet just for your equip list.

[Biffoniacus_Furiou]

Human Divine Minion of Anhur Saint (LA bought off), Wildshape Ranger 1/ Master of Many Forms 10/ Warshaper 4/ Occult Slayer 5/ Master of Many Forms 40. Note that the Complete Adventurer errata makes MoMF count toward your effective Druid level for Wild Shape.
At level ~39 hire an NPC Wizard to use Genesis to create your own pocket plane where time goes by 500 times faster than the material plane. Have Leadership and Epic Leadership, put all your followers in your pocket plane, build a self-sustaining ecosystem and encourage them to multiply and populate the demiplane. Teach them to worship you as a god. Feel free to spend every penny you have doing this, but leave enough to hire an NPC Psion for a Psychic Reformation and get Vow of Poverty and Epic Vow of Poverty, which among other things gives you Divine Rank 0. Per Deities and Demigods chapter 2, a deity with a few hundred to a few thousand followers has a divine rank of 1-5, a few thousand to tens of thousands of worshipers gets divine rank 6-10, hundreds of thousands of followers is divine rank 11-15, etc. You should easily have enough followers to have a divine rank in the neighborhood of 4, which will allow you to have Salient Divine Abilities. By the time characters are level 30, they should be gods.

[TeslaJr]

Changeling master of many forms into illithid savant, then build your own class from the class and racial features of others. Make sure you eat a hagunemnon for their shapeshifting, and an aleax of an earlier version of yourself for Ex Shapechange.

...Bwuh?

First, clarify how much WBL you have, since the ELH doesn't provide numbers for above 40th level. Regressing a curve to the wonky pattern suggests that you get about 98,500,000 gp. That is going to massively impact what you do.

About 65mil


I think this is for a one off, gladiatorial thing, so I can't really go out and get someone to cast spells on me. Also, he said that Permanent Spells are out, so I'm assuming that means spells in general.

[Rubik]

...Bwuh?

Say what?

"What?"

[TeslaJr]

Say what?

"What?"

Yeah

I didn't know Illithid Savant's could take class abilities. I've also never even heard of a hagunemnon

[Phelix-Mu]

It should also be possible to have a Factotum build that can own enough action economy even without spells to be able to kill pretty much anything in a single round. Added bonus of being a crazy skill monkey with lots of downtime options (as many as any other noncaster would have).

As much as I like the idea of having someone cast genesis for your character, that too is rather silly. What spellcaster casts genesis for someone else? That is pretty much guaranteed to get the spellcaster offed as part of ensuring the security of the demiplane, lol.

A much better question is what will you need to kill to level up. I once calculated that a level 75 character I came up with would need to kill a couple dozen hecatonchires to level up (though this was 3.0...the calculus may have changed slightly).

[cosmonuts]

Unrelated question - can I gate in an aleax of myself, even if no god really has it out for me?

[TeslaJr]

It should also be possible to have a Factotum build that can own enough action economy even without spells to be able to kill pretty much anything in a single round.

Yeah, Factotum's are pretty sweet, but I think I'm gonna stay away from that.

A much better question is what will you need to kill to level up. I once calculated that a level 75 character I came up with would need to kill a couple dozen hecatonchires to level up (though this was 3.0...the calculus may have changed slightly).

I think these characters are for a short one session thing, so leveling up shouldn't come into play. Still, a couple dozen hecatonchires? That's scary

[TeslaJr]

Unrelated question - can I gate in an aleax of myself, even if no god really has it out for me?

Aren't Aleax's made from part of a deity? If they are, I don't think you could Gate in one.

[Phelix-Mu]

Unrelated question - can I gate in an aleax of myself, even if no god really has it out for me?

I'd be really surprised if there isn't at least one god that has it in for a given 60th level character. But, assuming you are talking a different setup, I'd probably say no. Gate mentions "unique" creatures as being ungateable. Generally, unique is ill-defined in the game (by which I mean totally not defined). But, an aleax of a given person is pretty much unique, custom made by a god to punish that given person.

Plus, the aleax doesn't exist until the god wills it into being, from what I recall. So I'd say first you need the angry god.

[Rubik]

I didn't know Illithid Savant's could take class abilities.

They can steal four things (in addition to the bardic knowledge-esque illithid lore they get): feats, skills, class abilities, and racial abilities. Basically, find abilities you like (such as the choker's and chronotyryn's abilities to warp the action economy) and go to town. You have 60 levels to play with. Have fun with that.

I've also never even heard of a hagunemnon

It's in the SRD. It's a shapeshifting ooze-like creature that can mix-and-match the abilities of other creatures via shapeshifting. Note that, since you're gaining racial abilities as class abilities, you keep these racial traits regardless of what form you take otherwise, which counts for any other racial ability you steal.

[TrueJordan]

Centaur, templated with any template that gives more than 2 STR for each LA; with Warblade 1/Hulking Hurler 3/Master Thrower 1/Bloodstorm Blade 10/Warhulk (The Rest)

Throw planets, hitting everyone in line of sight (and everyone stupid enough to stand next to someone else twice)

Does it technically require an attack roll?
I'd like to introduce you to friendly fire.
http://dndtools.eu/spells/exemplars-...ly-fire--4965/

[Phelix-Mu]

Does it technically require an attack roll?
I'd like to introduce you to friendly fire.
http://dndtools.eu/spells/exemplars-...ly-fire--4965/

Hmm. Hulking Hurler can, if memory serves, attack the square you are standing in. I think that might get around the friendly fire thing. Close call, though. I'd need to read both effects carefully.

[TuggyNE]

At 60th level, I can't see why you couldn't just write whatever you want on your character sheet and call it a day. It's not as though there'd be no mechanical way to achieve it, and it can't unbalance things any more than simply playing at 60th level already will, so why not?

[boxfox]

You realize that you're not rolling your character, right?

No DM says, "Let's start at level 60, with absolutely no support for anything in any book ever!"

You're actually rolling one of several characters, possibly:

• The BBEG
• A rival party for the future
• The gods who make up the pantheon of your DM's universe
• A "Future you" who will come back in time to tell you important stuff or blah blah blah....
• An ancestor who was world-renowned and blah blah blah...
• Some other over-done, under-contemplated, and probably unsuccessful story stunt that will probably be either empty fluff that could have been avoided (Thus saving your party lots of useless work), or too powerful (which will likely end in TPK).

Other possibilities exist, but I believe them to be far more unlikely. If I were you, I wouldn't put much work into it and would actually keep it fairly weak...at the same time, think of every single way you can possibly kill this creature, because it's fairly likely that you may need to eventually...

[Graypairofsocks]

War Hulk, FB, and, with 60 levels, you might even be able to finagle in Cavalier and do all of this in a mounted charge that raises your multiplier by another 4.

Just make sure to take War Hulk at epic levels to avoid its lack of Bab advancement.

[Fouredged Sword]

You COULD find two people with aleax though, and eat those. It wouldn't harm the aleax, but it would grant you the ability to only be harmed by someone who is simultaneously two people (not impossible, but you go smite one of them immediately, just make sure to really wipe his soul, not just kill him).

[Chronos]

I'd recommend 19 levels of Knight (or 20, might as well at that point). At that level, not auto-failing saves on a natural 1 is absolutely essential.

[Frozen_Feet]

Between Feat Rogue, Fighter and some creative after-epic multiclassing, you should be able to get basically all Fighter feats. Dreaming of crazy damage multipliers for charging is thinking small, you should be able to pull off any combat style with dignity. As far as Epic feats go, be sure to nab Expectional Deflection, Infinite Deflection, Reflect Arrows and Distant Shot.

The first three allow you to laugh at any ranged attack, including Orbs of Metamagic'd Death. If it's a ranged attack, it bounces right back to the attacker.

The last one allows your own ranged attacks to hit anything you can see. Max out Balance and Spot. These allow you to walk on air at will and spot & fire at things from arbitrary distances. Haul your ass to high orbit and throw meteors at unwitting targets with Hulking Hurler abilities.

You should also be able to pull off some sort of "immunity to damage" combo in 60 levels, even without using any items. Maybe check the Emerald Legion for inspiration?

[Dr. Azkur]

[...]I've also never been past 30th level[...]

Is anyone ever past level 21st? I am a little overwhelmed!

[boxfox]

Is anyone ever past level 21st? I am a little overwhelmed!

My favorite campaign idea involves levels 1-20 fighting material plane with a few other planes eventually, then 21-40 players are freely traveling between planes and possibly dimensions, and for levels 41-60 they're actually going up against the gods.

It's straight forward and fairly linear, though absolutely ripe with possibilities. It's also very newbie friendly, as someone who hardly plays has the time to learn their character, their role, the world, the planes, and then everything afterward step by step. It's slow enough to allow them to be comfortable but fast enough to rarely end with TPK unless the party is made up of stupid kids.

[Dr. Azkur]

My favorite campaign idea involves levels 1-20 fighting material plane with a few other planes eventually, then 21-40 players are freely traveling between planes and possibly dimensions, and for levels 41-60 they're actually going up against the gods.

It's straight forward and fairly linear, though absolutely ripe with possibilities. It's also very newbie friendly, as someone who hardly plays has the time to learn their character, their role, the world, the planes, and then everything afterward step by step. It's slow enough to allow them to be comfortable but fast enough to rarely end with TPK unless the party is made up of stupid kids.

Mine is a 'greekish myth'-styled, good-old-walked descent into Baator, layer per layer, which eventually would take anyone to epic.
If you have the luck divine grace of gaming with a group that will stay together that long... I truly envy you.

[Studoku]

I'd recommend 19 levels of Knight (or 20, might as well at that point). At that level, not auto-failing saves on a natural 1 is absolutely essential.

Alternatively, one level of warblade (needs to be at level 11+) and enough ranks of concentration. Take the three "make a concentration check as a save" manoeuvres and always have them prepared.

[Rubik]

There are lots of ways to ensure you don't fail on a nat 1, including lots and lots and lots of rerolls -- from spells and powers to magic items to feats to class features.

Also, ensuring you're immune to 99.99999% of everything is pretty essentially the same thing (but better), and quite easy with that much money.

[Fouredged Sword]

At 60th level, if you are only making 1 save a round, you are not being threatened.