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Out of curiosity, how many people would be interested in participating and/or judging in such a contest?
I might. It could be a good bench test of how balanced a class is. It is not quite playtesting, but should help iron out a few potential imbalances before playtesting.
I suggest you start another thread though. You may also be able to solicit more interest & feedback regarding the idea.
In 1st, WinWin's Sway!
In 2nd, The Vorpal Tribble's Brolly!
In 3rd, Chineselegolas's Urog!
In 4th, Eldariel's Fistbear Bearfist!
In 5th, OMG PONIES's Felix!
In 6th, Draz74's Ruszel!
In 7th, Amphetryon's Bertram Urrni!
Congratulations to all who entered, especially our 2 winners!
Good competition, y'all! I'm surprised, I expected to be dead last by a long shot for my first entry. My hat goes off to the other competitors, who actually found interesting uses for the class (sick birds?! Dog church?!!!!) beside my idea to grab a leopard, make him big, and sneak around.
Also, my build may need to be docked a few points. I just now realized that I can only use my arcane dilettante spell 1/day. I thought I could drop reduce person every encounter, but knowing it's once a day would mean I need a permanent scroll of it or somesuch.
I dropped out simply because the only redeeming feature of GSA was that +15 in 10 levels. I had a few builds centered around that in my master spellthief mini-guide, even. With the 3/4 bab and only 10/10 in caster levels, it simply feels poor.
Ah, but I wasn't going by the 15/10 CL increase. I was going with the +5 CL increase and +5 spellcaster level increase in between. I had 8 levels, which gives 4 spellcaster levels and a +4 CL bonus.
AbjChamp set CL to BAB (which finished 17/20), then Illumian Krau sigil set the CL to BAB +2 (to a max of HD), then GSA gave its +4 CL bonus, for a CL that is 3 points higher than your HD (or 23 at ECL20). Then tack on Tenacious Spellcasting from Suel and you have a CL 9 higher than your HD to resist dispels. You can apply things in the order you choose. You simply apply GSA's caster level increase AFTER AbjChamp does its work (17 BAB + 2 Krau + 4 GSA = CL23). GSA's CL increase is worded similar to Archmage's CL, or Master Specialist's CL increase, or similar. And while it did slow down Suel casting, it still finished all 10 levels of Suel casting by ECL20 so nothing was left unfinished.
If I had included a better write up of that little math trick, I think it would have helped my UoSI score at least.
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A beholder’s favorite foods include small live mammals, exotic mushrooms and other fungi, gnomes, beef, pork, colorful leafy vegetables, leaves, flower petals, insects, and birds.
If you feel like something was missed, you probably should have elaborated on it a bit more.
Oh, I know that. There are a number of things I had all written out in my mind about the build, which I literally just didn't have time to type out. The deadline for this contest came awfully fast, somehow, and during a few awfully busy days ...
EDIT: That said, I was very puzzled by your comment that Heroics is a terrible use of the Factotum's Arcane Dilettante ability. I've always seen it as a very strong combo ... what's wrong with it?
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Work on my homebrew system, CRE8, is still marching slowly onwards. I think I can see the light at the end of the tunnel -- an Alpha release -- in the distance now. Read my Design Goals here.
Ah, but I wasn't going by the 15/10 CL increase. I was going with the +5 CL increase and +5 spellcaster level increase in between. I had 8 levels, which gives 4 spellcaster levels and a +4 CL bonus.
AbjChamp set CL to BAB (which finished 17/20), then Illumian Krau sigil set the CL to BAB +2 (to a max of HD), then GSA gave its +4 CL bonus, for a CL that is 3 points higher than your HD (or 23 at ECL20). Then tack on Tenacious Spellcasting from Suel and you have a CL 9 higher than your HD to resist dispels. You can apply things in the order you choose. You simply apply GSA's caster level increase AFTER AbjChamp does its work (17 BAB + 2 Krau + 4 GSA = CL23). GSA's CL increase is worded similar to Archmage's CL, or Master Specialist's CL increase, or similar. And while it did slow down Suel casting, it still finished all 10 levels of Suel casting by ECL20 so nothing was left unfinished.
That's what I meant. You slow down Suel A LOT for very little benefit. The same build with BAB 19 and no GSA would have CL 21, faster spellcasting and extra class features. If you used Master Spellthief (say, Spellthief 4/Duskblade 6/Suel 4/Abjurant Champion 5/Spellsword 1), you'd actually get HIGHER base attack (18) and higher caster level (18+2 Krau +10 Master Spellthief = 30).
It simply looks like a subpar choice. GSA is really bringing the build down a lot.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Keld Denar
If I had included a better write up of that little math trick, I think it would have helped my UoSI score at least.
Yeah, I agree.
Last edited by true_shinken : 08-16-2010 at 01:13 PM.
EDIT: That said, I was very puzzled by your comment that Heroics is a terrible use of the Factotum's Arcane Dilettante ability. I've always seen it as a very strong combo ... what's wrong with it?
Mostly that duration is way too short and it takes an action. You can't really use it out of combat , especially in this case since your CL is lowish, you can't Extend it because its a SLA. If you use it in combat to grab a feat, it eats up your standard action for a round, giving you a rather limited return. And its only once a day.
Yea, its really versatile, but not that amazing. Most uses of Heroics I've seen generally involve a free grab at Improved Init or Improved Toughness for a touch of extra speed/resiliance. Everything else, if you are basing your character around it, you are better off spending the feat. The only REALLY circumstantial time I could see this being really useful is if you ran into a Hydra, and wanted to pick up Imp Sunder for a little while. Then again, 9/10 times its easier to just KILL THE HYDRA WITH DAMAGE than try to chop off/cauterize the heads.
Quote:
Originally Posted by true_shinken
GSA is really bringing the build down a lot.
Ah, but it brings it down MUCH less than it brought down every other build. Thats worth something, right? Otherwise you could just say that any build that contains 0 levels of GSA is the best GSA build, which kinda defeats the purpose.
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A beholder’s favorite foods include small live mammals, exotic mushrooms and other fungi, gnomes, beef, pork, colorful leafy vegetables, leaves, flower petals, insects, and birds.
Last edited by Keld Denar : 08-16-2010 at 01:49 PM.
Mostly that duration is way too short and it takes an action. You can't really use it out of combat , especially in this case since your CL is lowish, you can't Extend it because its a SLA. If you use it in combat to grab a feat, it eats up your standard action for a round, giving you a rather limited return. And its only once a day.
Hmmm ... it's 10/minutes per level, which is better than most buffs. Seems like that could cover at least a couple encounters per day (especially in a dungeon crawl-style). Admittedly it's a lot better on a single-class Factotum than on a multiclasser.
And you can Extend it, since the Factotum description includes a special exception for its SLAs (interacting with Metamagic), in contrast with other SLAs.
Quote:
Yea, its really versatile, but not that amazing. Most uses of Heroics I've seen generally involve a free grab at Improved Init or Improved Toughness for a touch of extra speed/resiliance. Everything else, if you are basing your character around it, you are better off spending the feat.
Sure, it would be better to just take the feat rather than relying on a buff ... but on a feat-starved build (like any Factotum I've ever seen), having one more feat part of the time is better than never having it.
Quote:
The only REALLY circumstantial time I could see this being really useful is if you ran into a Hydra, and wanted to pick up Imp Sunder for a little while. Then again, 9/10 times its easier to just KILL THE HYDRA WITH DAMAGE than try to chop off/cauterize the heads.
Yeah, Improved Sunder is pretty worthless compared to just killing the hydra's body (though my recent group didn't realize this, which was humorous).
You need to think a lot more creatively with Heroics, though. Improved Toughness and Improved Initiative are far from the best it can do ... try Martial Study and Martial Stance, just to name two very versatile choices.
__________________
You can call me Draz. Trophies:
Work on my homebrew system, CRE8, is still marching slowly onwards. I think I can see the light at the end of the tunnel -- an Alpha release -- in the distance now. Read my Design Goals here.
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Re: Iron Chef Optimization Challenge IX
