[3.5] Favorite Obscure Prc, Feat, Spell etc.

[Mr Adventurer]

You also wouldn't be able to cast the Miracle spell itself while in an Antimagic Field...

[Venger]

You also wouldn't be able to cast the Miracle spell itself while in an Antimagic Field...

While it doesn't let you do miracles, invoke magic is an extremely cool spell from lords of madness that lets you cast up to 4ths in an amf or even a plane with no magic.

[Jowgen]

The single most obscure spell I know, that I also get a lot of mileage out of in all sorts of optimization exercises, is Womb of the Earth from Dragon 279 p. 35.

So we are talking like dawn of 3e pre-paizo dragon mag (Jan 2001, less than 6 months since the first PHB printing), older than most people ever bother going back to. Not a single collection of dragon mag spells I know has it listed, not even bloody DragonDex.

A mere 1st level cleric spell that makes the enrichment version of plantgrowth look like a ray of frost next to blizzard. You can grow so much stuff with this in such a short amount of time, the second you can apply it to any remotely valuable plant, you can basically tank the world economy.

[Venger]

when I saw the name i was going to ask if it was adapted into land womb (another weird spell) but evidently not.

full text here for the curious.

[ayvango]

Off the top of my head... Also I may be wrong but I think they’re the only player race with a bite attack that isn’t something cherry picked out of a monster manual.

Kobolds have bite attack too.

[Vizzerdrix]

I'll start with a few things. I won't post everything now. Its late, and a lot of things I would add are already here.

Nybor's Psychic Imprint
http://archive.wizards.com/default.a...d/mb/20041215a
Is a great way to enhance magic items during casting, or keep a buddy around.

Watchspider
Animal companion magical beast. Never worry about training tricks. Big enough for a small rider. Comes with poison. Look up the old spew handbook for some fun ideas.

Spikards, and alchemy blade from Eberron. Interesting little weapons with fun damage boosts.

Plant companion (dragon mag) Id love to see what people can do with this some day. I feel it has a lot of potential.

Gnome Artificer.
It tries its hardest to do something new and unique. Shame it isn't good.

Vrill- fearless goblin warrior slaves of the drow. Cool looking too.

corral growth, suspension, Shalantha's Delicate Disk, minor servator Create crawling claw, create darkenbeas, sticks and stones, sticks to snakes, syphon and Engulfing terror are all spells I don't see mentioned often.

Aleax is a monster that IF you can beat it, will give you some huge bonuses. Im surprised hunting them isn't part of most builds.

[Venger]

Kobolds have bite attack too.

no they don't

I'm a big fan of dukar hand coral. slowly heals you and even enables minor regeneration. pretty cool especially for the cost.

[ayvango]

It was updated online: http://archive.wizards.com/default.a...d/we/20060420a

[Meditation]

My apologies. I had a brain fart on the size. They are indeed medium-sized, both in MMIII and the web article. As penance, please consider the Hornhead Saurial from the Serpent Kingdoms Web Enhancement, which is the only large-sized humanoid that hasn't been errata'd into a different creature type.

As mentioned before, in this very thread, the L5R/Oriental Adventures Naga that is set explicitly for PCs and was grandfathered into 3.5 because it did not have an update is Large sized and has no LA (for several subspecies), has no HD, and solid stats for many builds (and isn’t in Dragon magazine). Bizarrely, this is probably the tenth time in nearly as many years I’ve mentioned this in a thread and had someone miss it and pick a worse option for a large race. It’s even happened in person. It’s long-past officially surreal.


Hey: would you like the swarm subtype? Sure you would. It’s neat. Get Dragon #350 allowed at your table and take Brood Keeper’s Heart and bind it to your Heart chakra (hm, that sounds clumsy) and rely on miss chance or monk bonuses for AC ‘cause your armor bonuses don’t work and your AC now sucks. What damage do you do? Who knows. Entertaining. One could wonder why tables don’t all automatically accept Dragon material.

You can have more fun by binding the Chaos Roc’s Span in the same article to get two reach secondary natural attacks that do nonlethal damage. Spiffy: lots of ins and outs there making for a pretty cool and balanced setup. Bind it to your shoulders and hit a target with both wings and the target is dazed and oh yeah that’s why Dragon is cruddy.

The technically-legal Kingdoms of Kalamar adventure Forging Darkness has an item called the Coin of Power (what it lacks in clever it recoups in accuracy) that can be thrown at someone once a month to utterly kill that person at tremendous drawbacks. Don’t throw it. Just carry it around and get 2 free class levels. Also, if two coins of this kind ever touch they explode. So don’t do that. This is obscure for a reason.

Hizagkuur is a material from Underdark from the Underdark that gets its armor user cold resistance 2, its weapon user +1 electricity damage and +1 fire damage, and counts-as-silver versus DR for 2k or 12.5k, respectively. Mid-to-late game characters optimizing damage could absorb that cost.

Mental Rage is a psionic power in the Telepathy discipline that does untyped energy damage to everything vs. a Reflex save in a medium-sized area around you at a pretty good damage rate, allowing for a decent punish for approaching you. It gives you an AC-penalty that you can spam power points to remove, so overchannel/wild surge and go to town. Its downside is that it’s concentration, so Solicit Psicrystal and make the rock do it.

[Venger]

A poster after my own heart dunking on the terrible totemist melds and how they don't unerstand how monsters work. What in the heck do they think a natural attack with reach looks like? Are your wings just tips with the middle missing like Rayman's hands?

Mental rage sure is cool. Never even heard of it before. Damage kind of sucks, but range and duration is pretty cool.

Speaking of obscure online material, I'm a big fan of steal steel. It was from one of the mind's eye, but I'm having a devil of a time finding a link to it. It's a 5th level psion power, psychoportation, and you blast yourself into a sword, becoming essentially untargetable and indestructible. If that sword touches another sword, like during a swordfight, you can blast your consciousness into this new sword and so on. There's some more details I'm forgetting. It's a very involved spell, kind of like magic jar. If anybody can find a link so others can enjoy it, I'd certainly appreciate it.

[Vizzerdrix]

no they don't

I'm a big fan of dukar hand coral. slowly heals you and even enables minor regeneration. pretty cool especially for the cost.

Source on that coral?

[Venger]

Source on that coral?

champions of valor p63. doubles your natural healing rate, lets you regenerate severed body parts, helps you breathe underwater, and emits light when you meet shake hands with someone else smart enough to have one. fun, flavorful item and a good use of resources for 1600gp.

[Mr Adventurer]

Hizagkuur dealing two elemental damage types is useful for Dragonfire Adepts with use of the ... Dragon Breath Cincture? The one that increases the DC or the damage of your breath weapon (I forget which) so long as you are wielding a magic weapon that deals the same kind of elemental damage as the breath weapon. Hizagkuur for electricity and fire, weapon crystal of Energy Assault for cold or acid (or sonic) and weapon enhancement properties for any others you need. Dragoncraft weapons also add a small amount of energy damage in this way, but only one type at a time. I think I had a Dragonfire Adept with a crossbow with an Energy Assault crystal, a Dragoncraft bayonet attached to it with its own Energy Assault crystal.

[Troacctid]

As mentioned before, in this very thread, the L5R/Oriental Adventures Naga that is set explicitly for PCs and was grandfathered into 3.5 because it did not have an update is Large sized and has no LA (for several subspecies), has no HD, and solid stats for many builds (and isn’t in Dragon magazine). Bizarrely, this is probably the tenth time in nearly as many years I’ve mentioned this in a thread and had someone miss it and pick a worse option for a large race. It’s even happened in person. It’s long-past officially surreal.

First off, they were updated to 3.5 in Dragon 318 and given level adjustments. Second, even if they weren't, that's not how LA works. Their entries don't list a level adjustment at all. In 3.0, that means LA —. Third, what do you mean no HD? They totally have racial hit dice. Are we reading different monster entries?

OA nagas are mostly notable for being Large-size humanoid forms for alter self, and even that is only if you disregard the update, which changed the Large ones to monstrous humanoids.

[Vizzerdrix]

First off, they were updated to 3.5 in Dragon 318 and given level adjustments. Second, even if they weren't, that's not how LA works. Their entries don't list a level adjustment at all. In 3.0, that means LA —. Third, what do you mean no HD? They totally have racial hit dice. Are we reading different monster entries?

OA nagas are mostly notable for being Large-size humanoid forms for alter self, and even that is only if you disregard the update, which changed the Large ones to monstrous humanoids.

I could have sworn their LA was listed on a different page. I'll go book diving to see what I can find later.

[Zombulian]

It was updated online: http://archive.wizards.com/default.a...d/we/20060420a

Kinda making my point for me there champ.

[ayvango]

Nybor's Psychic Imprint
http://archive.wizards.com/default.a...d/mb/20041215a

It's a perfect spell for action economy. I wonder why I never encountered it before. You could ask trusted wizard to cast such spell on you and use your personality to create copy of your consciousness (ability drain could be restored or prevented easily), then infuse that copy into a magic item. Now there are two of "you" that could act independently each round.

[daremetoidareyo]

A-words trypthic or something from the wyrms of the North archive allows you to use a 5th level spell slot to activate 3 wands in succession. Crazy good

[WhamBamSam]

There are a few feats that can give you a bite attack as well. Warforged can get one via the Jaws of Death feat, and any race can use Deformity (Teeth) or Planar Touchstone (Catalogues of Enlightenment: Hunger Domain). Since the latter only requires one feat it can essentially make any bonus feat race a de facto race with a bite.

Tangentially related, they're not super obscure, but I do really like Frostblood Orcs and Half-Orcs for the ability to take any other feat they qualify for when they'd otherwise get Endurance as a bonus feat, essentially making them feat-neutral with Humans as a Ranger race, or better if you want more feats that you don't qualify for at level 1.

[Zombulian]

There are a few feats that can give you a bite attack as well. Warforged can get one via the Jaws of Death feat, and any race can use Deformity (Teeth) or Planar Touchstone (Catalogues of Enlightenment: Hunger Domain). Since the latter only requires one feat it can essentially make any bonus feat race a de facto race with a bite.

Tangentially related, they're not super obscure, but I do really like Frostblood Orcs and Half-Orcs for the ability to take any other feat they qualify for when they'd otherwise get Endurance as a bonus feat, essentially making them feat-neutral with Humans as a Ranger race, or better if you want more feats that you don't qualify for at level 1.

Sorry, I should have been more clear. I’m perfectly aware that there are plenty of ways to get a bite attack. The thing that strikes me about Darfellan is that they’re a race in the races section of a book with a bite attack that they get for free, while also not being a monstrous race with a level adjustment. Bonus points for the fact that while just looking at the illustrations for them, Darfellan certainly don’t look like they have a bite attack that does 1d6 damage.

[Meditation]

First off, they were updated to 3.5 in Dragon 318 and given level adjustments.

No. They. Weren’t.

*sigh* Nearly 10 years of this, seriously.

There are two mechanically and editorially different suites of game assets called Naga in Oriental Adventures (L5R d20). Both of them have several Naga subspecies called bloodlines (as if we didn’t use that term enough in d20). One of them is explicitly called out as a PC option whereas the other is a “monster” race where several subspecies have high amounts of LA and HD. The former was NOT updated in 3.5 and thus explicitly grandfathered into 3.0, while the latter was seriously nerfed because the 3.0 monster Naga had such a small LA/HD requirement for its weaker subspecies that it was almost as good a deal as Lolth-Touched.

I said nearly all this in the first post, btw.

This happens every time.

Third, what do you mean no HD? They totally have racial hit dice. Are we reading different monster entries?

Yes. You’re not reading the right entry. You’re not reading my whole post.

Please read the post.

Look up the entry I cited. . . not the entry you searched. Did I cite Dragon magazine? Nope. You know why? Because the PC stats weren’t updated in Dragon magazine — just the monster stats. There are no monster entries for the PC Naga options in d20 at all.

(And thank God there aren’t, or it would be even more confusing.)

I swear, this subject is the only time where giving a citation on the internet literally feels worse than giving none at all. I kinda wish Dragon had updated the PC version — people read it more than the OA supplement.

I don’t think this is anyone’s fault, btw. I seriously think this aspect of d20 is just cursed.

The thing that strikes me about Darfellan is that they’re a race in the races section of a book with a bite attack that they get for free, while also not being a monstrous race with a level adjustment. Bonus points for the fact that while just looking at the illustrations for them, Darfellan certainly don’t look like they have a bite attack that does 1d6 damage.

They get penalized by WotC overvaluing Strength, though -- Darfellan are a Str+2 race, so their stats suck. Get a sympathetic DM to give them a +2 to something and you're in business.

I love the fact that they have a swim speed. I like swim speeds. All they're missing is water breathing (they have breath holding -- bah). Hey, that coral stuff upthread will work. Sweet.

(And if you have the coral or stuff like that, breath-holding is actually a nice perk against some mid-level attacks.)

[Mr Adventurer]

They get penalized by WotC overvaluing Strength, though -- Darfellan are a Str+2 race, so their stats suck. Get a sympathetic DM to give them a +2 to something and you're in business.

+2 Str, -2 Dex and a handful of racial abilities seems absolutely fine for a LA +0 race; certainly not a basis to say "their stats suck".

[Thurbane]

Agreed. 1/2 Elves suck. 1/2 Orcs kinda suck. Goblins suck. Darfellans? I think they are a perfectly fine LA +0 race.

[Meditation]

+2 Str, -2 Dex and a handful of racial abilities seems absolutely fine for a LA +0 race; certainly not a basis to say "their stats suck".

Their abilities aren't the equivalent of a missing +2. The Darfellans objectively have lower stats because they have a Str bonus. Having an objective penalty for an unreasonable cause fits the conventional definition of "suck." PF eliminated this penalty and nothing caught fire. Nothing exploded. Hobgoblins have no LA there, either, for the same reason: Str isn't the end-all and be-all. Feel free to argue that one of the things Paizo got right here was wrong, but I'd be (likely pleasantly) surprised if you come up with evidence that hasn't been turned up by the internet et. al. in the past 10 years.

[pabelfly]

Their abilities aren't the equivalent of a missing +2. The Darfellans objectively have lower stats because they have a Str bonus. Having an objective penalty for an unreasonable cause fits the conventional definition of "suck." PF eliminated this penalty and nothing caught fire. Nothing exploded. Hobgoblins have no LA there, either, for the same reason: Str isn't the end-all and be-all. Feel free to argue that one of the things Paizo got right here was wrong, but I'd be (likely pleasantly) surprised if you come up with evidence that hasn't been turned up by the internet et. al. in the past 10 years.

Most LA0 races have equal stat adjustments in 3.5 - one or two +2s, and the same amount of -2s. I don't see anything different about a Darfellan, excepting that I'd seriously consider one if I wanted a humanoid for an aquatic campaign, and they lose most of their utility otherwise - except for that bite attack, which I like. Makes sense when they're packed into an aquatic-themed book.

[Particle_Man]

Hobgoblins in Pathfinder have no str bonus but get bonuses to dex and con. Some feel this makes them a bit too good.

[PoeticallyPsyco]

If anything Darfellans are strong for a +0 race. They compare favorably with humans, any way. Both have net +0 stats, but humans have a bonus feat. Would I spend a feat on a 40ft swim speed, a 1d6 bite attack, and echolocation? In an aquatic campaign you better believe I would! Darfellans do lose the bonus skill points and 10ft of land speed, which does sting, but in an aquatic campaign the human would probably be spending several of those skill points on Swim anyways just to break even with the Darfellan's +8 racial bonus, and land speed isn't as important when you're mostly either swimming or on the (relatively small) deck of a ship.

Darfellans are awesome, and I love them. Their racial history with the Sahuagin makes for great campaign hooks, too.

[Thurbane]

Yeah, I think there's some confusion going on here.

The vast bulk of LA +0 races in 3.5 have a net +0 to ability scores; most often in the form of +2 to one stat, and -2 to another. Elves get +2 Dex, -2 Con. Dwarves get +2 Con, -2 Cha.

Darfellans follow this same formula: +2 Str, -2 Dex. they are not better or worse off, stat wise, than the vast bulk of LA +0 races in 3.5.

I think there may be some confusion with the PF system, where most LA +0 races have a net +2 to ability scores.

[Jowgen]

One item from an obscure source, though I imagine it's reasonably well known by now, is Dungeon magazine 88 p. 104 's "Yenejg Togan's Planar Syllabus", which grants actual ranks in Knowledge (the planes).

[Venger]

One item from an obscure source, though I imagine it's reasonably well known by now, is Dungeon magazine 88 p. 104 's "Yenejg Togan's Planar Syllabus", which grants actual ranks in Knowledge (the planes).

All the freshmen who blew off the first class because all the professor does is read the syllabus: "Shoot!"