MM3 Sand Blaster Exotic Weapon Optimization

[Rubik]

Sand Blaster: MM3, p58. I'll quote the text here:

A sand blaster is a Large exotic ranged weapon made from long tubes. It creates a 10-foot cone of sand, doing 1d8 points of damage (Ref DC 10 + 1/2 HD + Con for half). Living creatures that fail their saves are tormented by itching skin and burning eyes, imposing a -4 penalty to AC and a -2 penalty on attack rolls for 3 rounds. The save DC is Con based. (It relies on the user's ability to blow a hearty gust of air through the tube.) A sand blaster uses 5 lbs of sand as ammunition, and packing a sand blaster with one charge of ammunition is a full-round action. A sand blaster costs 30 gp.

Why is this amazing?

See, since this exotic weapon doesn't use attack rolls, that means that magical enhancement bonuses to attack rolls are worthless. But it also means you don't need to take Exotic Weapon Proficiency with it, saving you a feat to spend on something else. You also don't need to worry about having a relatively low Str score, though I'm sure we can find a way to add your Str bonus to damage despite it making no sense. The aptitude enhancement and a feat, perhaps?

It's untyped damage, and it bypasses anything but full cover and utterly ignores concealment, as well as any other miss chance that isn't shunting the target into another plane altogether.

Furthermore, it deals damage in an area, and it's considered a ranged weapon. That means you can add weapon abilities such as Distance to increase the area it affects, as well as Far Shot and the Accuracy spell.

Adding a combination weapon crystal to it (MIC, use 50% surcharge to add additional weapon crystal properties) to add returning and lots of energy damage in an area for cheap, and the returning property returns all that sand to you.

Adding an auto-reload enhancement (which is normally used on crossbows) or adding the aptitude enhancement and taking the Rapid Reload feat allows you to automatically reload your sand blaster as a free action. If you have enough sand on you to make a full attack...you get a full attack. Including Rapid Shot and Manyshot. And since you don't make attack rolls, the penalties to your attack bonus from those feats are meaningless. And further, if you add the enhancements for something like Hank's Bow, feel free to Power Shot away your entire attack bonus with little worry.

And speaking of the aptitude enhancement, feel free to take feats such as Boomerang Daze and anything else you think can push this thing even farther.

Since the sand itself is considered ammo, you can even enhance it as such. This opens up a lot of fun combos between launcher and ammo, especially since it's an AoE.

There's a lot of optimization potential, here.

Anyone else have ideas on how to make this even better?

[edit] Just a note: since the sand is considered ammo, if you make yourself some masterwork shapesand and enhance it as magical ammo, each shot costs 1/50 the price of a regular weapon, and you can put a lot of specialty effects on them. The biggest problem is carrying it all; you can dump your Str because it won't help your damage, but you'll need it for carrying capacity.

Also, you can retrieve the shapesand after each battle, so it's reusable. Just make the various types of shapesand ammo different colors so you can separate them properly. [/edit]

[Zombimode]

Adding a combination weapon crystal to it (MIC, use 50% surcharge to add additional weapon crystal properties) to add returning and lots of energy damage in an area for cheap, and the returning property returns all that sand to you.

Your idea breaks down at this exact point. Neither is Returning a legal property for a Sandblaster nor would it do any good since all it does is to return thrown weapons the users hand (at the start of the users next turn, no less).

[Rubik]

Your idea breaks down at this exact point. Neither is Returning a legal property for a Sandblaster nor would it do any good since all it does is to return thrown weapons the users hand (at the start of the users next turn, no less).

Except anything can be thrown. It's a technicality, but improvised weapons have a 10' range increment, so it's doable, RAW. And as I said, so long as you have enough sand to make a full attack, you can make a full attack. The sand ammo just returns to you at the beginning of your next turn so you can do it all over again.

[ComaVision]

Two other thoughts:

Use Black Sand
Use poison

[Zombimode]

Except anything can be thrown. It's a technicality, but improvised weapons have a 10' range increment, so it's doable, RAW. And as I said, so long as you have enough sand to make a full attack, you can make a full attack. The sand ammo just returns to you at the beginning of your next turn so you can do it all over again.

If you are using the object of a sandblaster as an improvised throwing weapon then you are not firing the sandblaster. I fail to see how anything that is related to the actual use of the sandblaster would be relevant if you just throw it as an unwieldy stick.

[Rubik]

If you are using the object of a sandblaster as an improvised throwing weapon then you are not firing the sandblaster. I fail to see how anything that is related to the actual use of the sandblaster would be relevant if you just throw it as an unwieldy stick.

The only thing it would do would be to bring the sand back to you next round so you don't have to collect it. It's honestly not a big deal either way, especially if you can finagle your way into respawning ammo. Isn't there a weapon enhancement that automatically recreates and reloads ammo? That would certainly save you a feat.

[edit] Although launchers always bestow their enhancements to their ammo. I think that might work for returning, though again, it's not that important.

[Vaz]

I was expecting some useful tips and tricks and all we get is Weapon Aptitude Boomerang Daze.

Wow.

[Deadline]

The only thing it would do would be to bring the sand back to you next round so you don't have to collect it. It's honestly not a big deal either way, especially if you can finagle your way into respawning ammo. Isn't there a weapon enhancement that automatically recreates and reloads ammo? That would certainly save you a feat.

[edit] Although launchers always bestow their enhancements to their ammo. I think that might work for returning, though again, it's not that important.

I'm not sure some of these ideas work. Returning wouldn't work on ammunition (unless you throw the ammunition, which wouldn't get the Sandblaster's bonus). Many enchantments that should be useful won't be (like Quickloading). However, Aptitude Weapon and Rapid Reload might be a viable approach to getting more than one shot every two rounds. Hmm ... it bears some thought.

[Rubik]

I was expecting some useful tips and tricks and all we get is Weapon Aptitude Boomerang Daze.

Wow.

You don't think dazing an entire group of enemies in a 30' cone for every attack you make with six or more attacks per round is a good thing? This is a lot better than one enemy per hit, which is how Boomerang Daze normally works.

There's almost nothing immune to daze, after all. That can decimate the enemy even at epic levels, if you've got a reasonable DC.

Add in swift action movement from the Hustle power, Travel Devotion, or a Shadow Hand maneuver, or use the sparring dummy of the master and a ToB stance for dual 10' steps each round, and you can throw out those 30' cones all over the battlefield.

I'm asking for further optimization ideas, too, to increase the understanding for the potential of this weapon.

[Rubik]

Any source of damage and all effects added to the sand blaster or the ammo will be spread out amongst all targets, which makes a lot of enhancements and other boosters a LOT nicer than they otherwise could be. A dip in Factotum gives you +Int to damage everyone that's hit, and the Control Body/Solicit Psicrystal trick does the same. Spell storing and power storing mean that you can hit everyone in the AoE with the spell effect. The Vampiric Blade power will heal you really, really fast, if you hit enough enemies. Suppression will psionically target-dispel every enemy in range 3/day.

Defending means you can sink your entire weapon bonus into your AC without issue (assuming your DM agrees it can be used on more than just swords), and spellstrike will allow you to do the same for your saving throws.

Brilliant energy allows you to fire AoEs through walls.

Speed (obviously) grants an additional attack each round, which means an extra 30' cone.

And use shapesand as ammo so you can easily collect everything at the end of a fight and reuse it easily with a bit of focus.

[Vaz]

Aptitude Boomerang Daze is old hat mate.

You wouldn't be impressed with someone using the Pazuzu trick to obtain, well anything. Same applies here.

It is above questionable whether Aptitude actually affects BD, and more damning, you don't 'hit' with an area weapon. I'm not entirely sure you are reading the rules entirely as RAW among other things.

For example, there is no ranged increment iirc.

In short, wow. You've found ANOTHER use for weapon apitutude and boomerang daze.

Clap clap, was that what you wanted to hear?

[Rubik]

{scrubbed}

[Darrin]

Hmm. Con-based, so... no unseen servant shenanigans. Might be useful to a Dragonfire Adept that optimizes Con but tanks his other attributes.

Hmm. Ranged Pin... not sure how that works. Penetrating Shot... requires bow, crossbow, or sling. Maybe Bloodstorm Blade/Thunderous Throw for Power Attack?

[Eldan]

It's not really a thrown weapon, though.

I've looked through a few ranged prestige classes. Sadly, most of them explicitely mention they only work with bows, or there would be some nice stuff like ranged power attack.

[Rubik]

The psionic power Psionic Lion's Charge allows the manifester to make a full attack on the same round as a charge. The power merely allows a full attack and a charge to be used in the same round, but it doesn't put any limits on when you can make that full attack, or with what weapon you can use to make that full attack. So feel free to full attack with your sand blaster before you begin your charge, or somewhere in the middle of your movement, or even at the end, before your turn is up. Hit everything around you with a flurry of 30' dazing blasts, and try to get your charge target in the AoE, if it's a major threat. Then at the end of your charge, use a gauntlet or a close combat blade installed in your sand blaster to make your charge attack, possibly on a dazed foe.

[edit] Now we need to find ways to save on having to carry around 5 lb bags of sand everywhere. Can we Polymorph into a sand paraelemental or find a way to hook up a decanter of endless sand somehow?

[Rubik]

It's not really a thrown weapon, though.

But the ability doesn't require a thrown weapon. It requires a weapon that can be thrown. Anything can be thrown, even if it isn't a thrown weapon.

[sovin_ndore]

Well, a few things occur to me:

• Making attacks AOE benefit more from poison. In that vein, you might want to add the Virulent enhancement.
• Distance Enhancement would interract well with the 'shaped' attack method.
• Aptitude Enhancement for things like Rapid Reload would be pretty essential to making this weapon work.
• If you can get it approved, Dust of Sneezing and Choking is pretty broken and might be a viable 'ammunition' for this sort of contraption.

[Mehangel]

But the ability doesn't require a thrown weapon. It requires a weapon that can be thrown. Anything can be thrown, even if it isn't a thrown weapon.

I think the point that others are making is that even if you enchant it as an improvised thrown weapon, unless you use it as a thrown weapon the enchantments have no effect. As for transferring the enchantment to its ammunition, unless the weapon specifically says that its ammunition is thrown (which it doesnt), most people will interpret the ammunition as a projectile (as that is the most common), but since it neither says its a projectile nor a thrown ammunition, more strict interpretation means that it is neither a projectile or a thrown ammunition.

Needless to say, I agree with Vaz in that even if what you say is true, it isn't any more impressive than anything else you can do with weapon adaption.

[Rubik]

I'll go ahead and leave the returning bit alone, as I understand what you're saying and, yeah, it probably would work like that.

Needless to say, I agree with Vaz in that even if what you say is true, it isn't any more impressive than anything else you can do with weapon adaption.

I still think a half-dozen 30' cones that daze everyone in them is a lot better than dazing a single enemy per attack, especially if you ramp up the damage.

Most damage multipliers require charge attacks or Power Attack. Aside from the manyfang dagger enhancement, are there any damage multipliers that can be used with a sand blaster?

Well, a few things occur to me:

• Making attacks AOE benefit more from poison. In that vein, you might want to add the Virulent enhancement.

And definitely use Hidden Talent to grab Psionic Minor Creation. A few psionic dorje versions of eternal wands wouldn't be amiss, either.

• Distance Enhancement would interract well with the 'shaped' attack method.

As does Far Shot and the Accuracy spell. There aren't that many ways of improving range for it, honestly, but combining those three means you get 60' cones, which is reasonable enough.

• Aptitude Enhancement for things like Rapid Reload would be pretty essential to making this weapon work.

Definitely. This is something that's quite useful later on in your career, but the resources required are difficult to acquire in the early game.

• If you can get it approved, Dust of Sneezing and Choking is pretty broken and might be a viable 'ammunition' for this sort of contraption.

I wouldn't think so. It's not sand, which is what the sand blaster uses as ammo. There's regular sand, shapesand, and black sand. The latter two would be the most useful, as shapesand is easy enough to recoup after a fight (thereby making for easy enhanced ammo), whereas black sand deals additional damage and can replicate itself. Not sure what happens if you magically enhance black sand and allow it to replicate, though.

[sovin_ndore]

I figured the dust would be wishful thinking... not that it needs a better delivery mechanism to be broken.

There's regular sand, shapesand, and black sand. The latter two would be the most useful, as shapesand is easy enough to recoup after a fight (thereby making for easy enhanced ammo), whereas black sand deals additional damage and can replicate itself. Not sure what happens if you magically enhance black sand and allow it to replicate, though.

Shapesand does have issues with anyone being able to use the Wisdom checks; that may pose problems. I am not familiar with Black Sand, where is that from?

[Rubik]

Shapesand does have issues with anyone being able to use the Wisdom checks; that may pose problems.

I believe you need line of effect, like with most other things, and that wouldn't be available when it's loaded into the sand blaster, and there's just not time to do so while you're loading it into the thing.

I am not familiar with Black Sand, where is that from?

Sandstorm. It's a natural hazard that deals negative energy damage to anyone touching it. If you die from it, you turn into more black sand. An easy way to avoid this problem is the Tomb Tainted Soul feat, which makes you heal from negative energy damage. Or you could be undead, which ruins your Con score.

You can also create it using a spell.

Blood-seeking: A +1 special quality from Complete Warrior which allows the wielder of the sand blaster to ignore all cover, so long as the target is alive and the sand can flow around the obstruction. So that's both cover and concealment gone.

Bloodfeeding: Normally, this +1 special quality from the BoVD isn't worth much. It stores one "blood point" for every enemy it damages (up to a maximum of 50), and you can expend five points to deal +1 damage. Since you have to dole out fifty successful hits before you can deal the maximum +10 damage, this is kind of bleh. But sand blasters deal AoE damage, so it's a lot easier to rack up the blood points pretty quickly. Furthermore, that +10 damage applies to every enemy damaged in the AoE, making it even better. Not spectacular, but it's a lot better than it would be on most swords.

Consumptive: This one is a +2 special quality from the Planar Handbook. Normally it'd be quite meh, as it deals +1d6 negative energy damage, which is more than twice as bad as a regular energy damage ability (as +2 is well over twice as expensive as a +1). But when combined with black sand, this makes for a good AoE effect for groups who utilize undead extensively. Unleash the zombies and largely ignore their presence in your sand blaster's area, as the damage dealt by the weapon is basically subsumed by the negative energy damage. Is the effect worth it? Maybe.

Cursespewing: A +1 quality from the BoVD. The non-scaling DC 15 Will save kinda sucks, but throwing out an AoE save-or-suck that grants a -4 penalty to attack rolls, saving throws, skill checks, and ability checks is pretty great, especially given the penalties already enforced by the sand blaster itself, and most high level enemies won't have all three good saves, so it's likely to fail at least one of them against the weapon, the dazing, and this.

Dessicating: It's a +2 special quality from Sandstorm. Normally, spending a +2 quality for +1d6 damage against a limited array of enemies is teh suck, but there aren't many ways to resist it, it fits with the theme of the weapon, and it deals additional damage to plants and elemental creatures with the [water] subtype, so if you go against those often, it might be worthwhile. It also carries potential risk of dehydration for those hit with it, depending on environmental conditions. Already in a hot and arid environment where water is scarce and dehydration is a threat? You might be able to convince your DM to inflict dehydration on anyone caught in your AoEs.

Disarming: A +2 ability from the Arms & Equipment Guide. It explicitly allows you to disarm foes with a ranged weapon, which a sand blaster is. Have fun with your ranged AoE disarm.

Domineering: This is a +2 quality from Player's Guide to Faerun. As with the cursespewing weapon quality, this requires a Will save (DC 16), which enforces the shaken condition. Unfortunately, it's a fear effect, which is [mind-affecting], but it's still okay. Cursespewing is better, though, despite a slightly lower DC.

Exhausting and Strength sapping The former is a +1 special quality from Shining South, and the latter is a +2 from the BoVD. Unfortunately, Fort DCs 14 and 15 suck, but they do apply on every hit, and they enforce fatigue and exhaustion on the target, respectively, which are alright. You might be able to convince your DM to allow you to upgrade the former to the latter once you can afford it, as exhaustion is merely an upgraded form of fatigue. If not, wait until you can afford the strength sapping enhancement.

Fierce: It's a +2 quality from the Arms & Equipment Guide. It allows you to reduce your AC by up to your Dex mod to add to damage. If you're willing to rely on heavy armor while still having a high Dex score, use miss chances heavily, have a supremely high AC already, have already dazed or disabled all of the enemies on the battlefield, or can otherwise tank or avoid being hit, +Dex to damage is pretty great when you're affecting lots of enemies per hit. If your damage is high enough, who cares if your AC is low? All your enemies will be dead by the time their turns come up.

Impedance: A +3 special quality from the Planar Handbook. Any spellcaster hit by the weapon must make a Spellcraft, Intelligence, or Charisma check (whichever is highest) equal to 15 + the level of the spell or spell-like ability in order to cast (failure means the effect fizzles and the spell or use/day is lost). While most casters will have a high Spellcraft check, many spellcasting monsters do not. Expensive, but potentially valuable.

Magebane: A +1 special quality from Complete Arcane. Deals an additional +2d6+2 damage against spellcasters. Better than putting it on most melee weapons, because, while many casters have defenses against melee attacks, it's fairly difficult to gain immunity to a sand blaster's attacks unless you know it's coming.

Marrowcrushing and Wounding: The former is a +3 quality from the BoVD, and the latter is a +2 quality from the DMG. Each deals +1 point of Con damage when they successfully deal damage. Wounding is limited to those affected by critical hits, while marrowcrushing is not. +2 Con damage with every hit to a group of enemies is pretty nice, though the combined +5 cost is really steep.

Morphing: A +1 weapon quality from Underdark. While this is normally fairly useful, as it allows you to swap your weapon around at will, it's potentially even more useful on a sand blaster, as it allows you to add special weapon qualities you normally couldn't. Just morph it into something that qualifies, enhance it with the special qualities you want, and morph it back. Will your DM hit you with something heavy? Probably. But that's not my problem.

Phasing: A +2 weapon quality from Dragon Magazine #330. It can only be applied to ammo, which means it's best added to some shapesand so you can reconstitute it, but it passes through any cover up to 5' thick, including solid walls. Good for preemptive attacks when you know there are hostiles on the other side of a door. Normally, you'd have to deal with miss chances, but since those don't apply to a sand blaster...

Ravenous: A +2 weapon quality from Champions of Ruin. It deals +2d6 damage on any creature hit more than once in the round by that weapon. Since the sand blaster is not a melee weapon, it's not limited to use by Evil creatures. (Yes, I know that's probably not the intent, but that's how it's written, so...) Only really useful if you can reload as a free action using the aptitude enhancement and Rapid Reload feat, but it's pretty nice for hitting multiple creatures multiple times in a round, especially since the damage is the same as the sand blaster's (which is untyped).

Rusting: A +1 weapon quality from Shining South. Any metal shield or armor exposed to the sand blaster's AoE loses 1 point of AC bonus if it fails a DC 16 Fort save, and completely falls apart when it reaches 0 AC. If you don't mind sundering your loot, this isn't too bad, especially against mooks wearing ratty metal armor you wouldn't want to sell anyway.

Silent Strike: A +1 weapon quality from Dragon Magazine #330. Anyone hit by the weapon must make a DC 15 Will save or be hit with the Silence spell for 4 rounds, which is really nice against spellcasters. Also, if you play your cards right, you can hit yourself and your allies (hit them over the head with the tube, maybe? Or use in conjunction with the morphing property.) and purposefully flub your save to get a Silence effect at will.

Smoking: A +1 weapon quality from Lords of Darkness. At will, fill your space with smoke that gives you cover and nauseates anyone coming into your space, but you can see and breathe normally. Good for giving you concealment from ranged weapons while you repeatedly sand blast anyone who comes in range.

Souldrinking: A +4 weapon enhancement from the BoVD that deals a negative level on anything it hits. You don't get the benefits from critting with the sand blaster, but spreading multiple negative levels around like a mofo to large groups of enemies should make up for that shortcoming rather handily.

Sparkling: A +2 weapon quality from the Miniatures Handbook. It outlines everything it hits with the effects of a Faerie Fire spell, which is great if you suspect hiding or invisible foes, for foes affected by several effects which grant miss chances, and you manage to catch them in the sand blaster's AoE.

Sure striking: A +1 weapon quality from Player's Guide to Faerûn, Races of Faerûn, and the Arms and Equipment Guide. Overcomes all alignment-based DR. And since the base damage output for the sand blaster is something that can't really be upgraded easily, and alignment-based DR is fairly common, this is a reasonable thing to add to your shapesand ammo, if nothing else.

Weakening: A +3 weapon quality from Shining South. It deals 1 point of Str damage on a successful hit, which heals up 10 minutes later. Multiple hits stack, but the opponent's Str score can't fall below 1.

Oil chambers and wand chambers: These are both cheap weapon enhancements from Dungeonscape. The former are useful for applying an oil's or potion's effect to everything caught in the sand blaster's AoE, while the latter can be used to cast the Accuracy spell from a wand, or the Strength of My Enemy power from a dorje, both of which are extremely useful.

[Vaz]

Except anything can be thrown. It's a technicality, but improvised weapons have a 10' range increment, so it's doable, RAW. And as I said, so long as you have enough sand to make a full attack, you can make a full attack. The sand ammo just returns to you at the beginning of your next turn so you can do it all over again.

Hmm, but you cannot carry it. It would fall to the floor as you cannot properly carry it, 5lbs is a lot of sand, and takes a full round to pack it once more. There is no mention of how many things you can charge it with, suggests it defaults to one, so you can't really expend 6 attacks with it either.

[Rubik]

Hmm, but you cannot carry it. It would fall to the floor as you cannot properly carry it, 5lbs is a lot of sand, and takes a full round to pack it once more. There is no mention of how many things you can charge it with, suggests it defaults to one, so you can't really expend 6 attacks with it either.

A.) I've given up on this, and B.) Even when it was first discussed, I outright said that you still need enough sand to make a full attack. The returning was just so it came back to you to be easy to recoup. Just use shapesand and pull it to you after the fight using a Wis check.

By the way, a Medium sand blaster would use only 1.25 lbs of sand. That's 1/8 the amount, and the only difference is that it deals 1d6 damage, rather than 1d8.

[Eldan]

Does the damage scale with size? Because it does, grab a colossal one. Oversized weapons only give a penalty to hit, which doesn't matter here.

[Rubik]

Does the damage scale with size? Because it does, grab a colossal one. Oversized weapons only give a penalty to hit, which doesn't matter here.

Damage dice for weapons always scale with size, but you cannot wield a weapon more than two size categories above yours for 1-handers, or one for 2, IIRC.

[Soranar]

You could probably use the sandshaper PrC to give you a way to collect the sand easily. Technically you could even turn yourself into sand, charge the weapon, and have someone else blow you at the enemy.

[Abithrios]

You could probably use the sandshaper PrC to give you a way to collect the sand easily. Technically you could even turn yourself into sand, charge the weapon, and have someone else blow you at the enemy.

I am not really familiar with that class. Is there much optimization to be gotten from the person being launched in this manner? I feel like this tactic may now want two people if you can spray someone on your enemies to deliver some effect they have on themselves.

[daremetoidareyo]

sandshaper is a great way to go. Except you need 5 arcane caster levels to get in. So maybe duskblade, but you want to get some of them sweet fighter bonus feats. So maybe wizard with fighter bonus feats?

[Rubik]

Just a note: since the sand is considered ammo, if you make yourself some masterwork shapesand and enhance it as magical ammo, each shot costs 1/50 the price of a regular weapon, and you can put a lot of specialty effects on them. The biggest problem is carrying it all; you can dump your Str because it won't help your damage, but you'll need it for carrying capacity.

Also, you can retrieve the shapesand after each battle, so it's reusable. Just make the various types of shapesand ammo different colors so you can separate them properly.

Adding the above to the original post as an edit.

[Vhaidara]

Would that much sand fake up as much space as a javelin? If so, the Quiver of Ehlonnha might be able to help. Or whatever the one that stored like 500 arrows, 50 javelins, and 5 bows or something like that is.