u/bugbonesjerry

any takers?

i'm almost willing to bet on tar baphon because of feature creep and larloch's m.o of not involving himself until like half of his own subordinate liches have been dealt with because a lich that going point blank against an opposing force into combat are "idiot failures" (in a FAQ about larloch vs vecna in a FAQ hosted by ed greenwood basically) but i don't know how far tar baphons scope goes

just a stray thought i had and i wanted to make sure this is even possible before i go bringing it up to a friend who did indeed come up with a dragon disciple eldritch knight build that prioritizes natural attack building. nothing about the feat says it only works on manufactured weapons, just melee weapons which include natural weapons since they are very rarely ranged and its conceptually thematic for a DD to chomp down on something while basically setting off a bomb/psuedo breath weapon against it. the build includes dragon style which has that bonus to charging attacks so it could have a place there

this is like one of the most quoted unique powers he has that gets thrown around in discussions but almost never used. i heard its basically like a sword he can mentally manifest that has smite evil on all the time, is that even remotely correct? when does he use them?

>!We ended up avoiding combat against them entirely because they got bad ended by a lich we freed earlier in the campaign lol. There's something very Tactics Ogre about that, building up this guy as a POS villain and ultimately having him killed virtually off-screen by a side antagonist lol!<

level 11 arcanist basically my character got a unique bonus that made their strength score not total ass (14 now, but belts and other bonuses are on the table) and I've already pegged some combinations between buff spells and items that could raise their strength to the ballpark of 26-30 which I will be doing. I will also be investing in a spell totem when possible (can hold up to 3rd level personal spells to call upon as a swift action while polymorphed into a beast or magical beast).

There are character concept reasons attached for going in this direction but even still it's

1. mostly something I want them to be able to do every now and then, i'm not hard committing the entire build towards this direction, it's too late for that, but I do want to make it as optimal within the available margin as possible

2. I want to make use of the Lepidstadt Shifter exploit (casting while polymorphed).

So this is mostly all for Cool Points. The spells i've been looking at are the 5th level and above variants of Monstrous Physique and Beast Shape (magical beast shape included) with forms that have pounce, poison, or a breath weapon (since you can never go wrong there. Actually, I already have the forms already figured out but again any suggestions are appreciated.

Any tips to increase to-hit past raw strength with arcane spells, magic items, or even feats (a bit late to devote an entire feat tree to anything though even with retraining) are welcome.

I'm aware of Heroism/Greater and Greater Magic Fang permanency (don't have a druid but could UMD it maybe) but that's about it. I know BAB is an issue but frankly there isn't a solution to that besides like... Transformation, or maybe emblem of greed for monstrous physique (and Transformation defeats half of the point but again, not saying never)

Melee survivability is not an issue most of the time.

Magus? Eldritch Knight? I know EK is controversial these days when Magus is typically better but most of the spells that outright use gravity are pretty high level wizard spells that do not appear on the magus spell list and the only way to work around that is to go Eldritch Knight for the higher potential spell levels. Eschewing that, anything that does forced movement pushing or pulling opponents around that can just be reflavored as gravity is also on the table here.

I've been perusing options since last night honestly so I already have some idea of my options but I'd like some input regardless.

I currently have a Pixel 6a - it's still functioning but the outer layer of the screen has been coming off and I imagine it's only one fumbled thumbswipe from permanent damage so I'm being proactive. (As an aside, I've read this might be battery swelling - I don't think this is the case because this only started happening on the left side of the screen after it dropped screen-first onto a stone floor while i was asleep which also produced a touch deadzone, and usually it's the right side that starts coming off if it's the battery. But who knows)

This isn't the first Pixel 6 I owned, I got one a few years ago but unfortunately the screen totally broke after it fell out of my hands once.

Needless to say, on top of all of the other inherent issues with them (like batteries overheating very easily in warm climates) I am totally done with their short lifespan and I will not be getting another Pixel. It's a real shame too because they're one of the only brands that make sizes to my preference in my price range.

My emergency/backup phone (a moto one ace from like 2020 or 2022 i think) still works and has no significant issues beyond all of this other than just being unwieldly with how big it is. I do really like motorola phones, they tend to be very resilient from my experience, but most of the smaller form factors I've seen are way more expensive.

Anyways, specific criteria: $100-$200 max price range, not a google pixel. Small form (like a 6.1 inch screen) preferred but not required. anything with a model that has 128 gb of internal storage and 4-6 gb ram would be fine. most likely buying used/refurbished.

I don't use my phones for too much fancy stuff, the most intensive things maybe being 3DS emulation and occasional recording. Generally stuff that most phones released in the last 5 years should be able to do but I figure having something that was released later than 2022 might help with longevity lol.

edit: country is u.s.

I'm not even sure where to begin with this one, probably being one of the more difficult ones to capture the theme without just straight up reskinning almost everything since gadgetry is most represented in stuff like guns and things alchemists can make. So to address the elephant in the room, yes, this is another case of "easy mode is take a full caster and reskin spells as gadgets"

So aside from not knowing where to start, I know enough about the cartoon from having seen it to describe what the general idea is; He's a (rather dim-witted) investigator that is characterized by being a cyborg of some variety whose main powers is being able to change parts of his body to produce mechanical gadgets to fit the current situation, ranging from mundane to fantastical

Examples being stretchy limbs (extendable reach/grappling), propeller hat (flight), umbrella and parachute (used for slowfalling/feather fall), binoculars (enhanced perception), skates/skis (increased and adaptive movement speed), portable/instantaneously produced handcuffs (also grappling/restraining), grappling hook (manuverability), phone (sending i guess but this is probably of least importance), and a multitude of mundane items producible from his hands and fingers such as portable saws (which im pretty sure are usually supposed to help get through chains but could be a bladed weapon), blowtorches (energy attack/burning hands), fans (gust of wind), and cameras

my first thought is another UMD centric 3/4 caster, Scavenger Investigator seems like the closest to a gadgeteer based class though it doesn't really encapsulate the on-demand and spontaneous (or i guess "cartoony") vibe of inspector gadget himself. I was thinking maybe something metamorph adjacent would be up the right track, but the actual "metamorph" archetype for alchemist doesn't really fit and actual Shifters don't either. There might be some tek in taking the Brilliant Planner feat to assuage some of this, but generally it feels like a character that is using a lot of low to mid level spells to solve immediate physical problems that range from mundane to extreme.

In the show, he's shown to be pretty damn clueless (so low wisdom) to the point of being easily manipulable like a third of the time at least, and despite being an investigator the real brains that keeps him on the right track is his niece who usually coordinates things with him behind the scenes (and their dog, who occasionally intervenes to help him)

suggestions for next week's segment are welcome, when in doubt i'm most likely going to pull an outdated cartoon character

pact wizard gets an Oracle Curse at level 5, using the usual multiclass oracle rule of calculating it at half of character level

what happens if you multiclass into an oracle after that? do you just... select another curse that tracks normally? or does it start adding your oracle levels to your "effective" oracle level?

is this addressed in any rule at all? I kinda assume not because oracle curses are naturally supposed to be super exclusive

historically one of the oldest and most bizarrely widespread of mystical traditions that you've probably heard some version of whether it be from anecdotes about attilla the hun or tales from the bible recounting the practices of ancient babylon; i'll save you the full history explanation but a widespread oral tradition method of divination where one engages in the practice of analyzing the liver/entrails of goat/sheep carcasses as a means of divining the future and the nature of omens

i've heard the occultist is basically able to be built into doing stuff like this but i know next to nothing about them other than they're a very modular spellcasting class. any other candidates? "divination wizard but roleplay your spells as doing this" is a valid take but that feels like the easy way out

title

let us pay no attention to the fact that it is no longer sunday. but according to the villains wiki, gargamel is a educated "sorcerer" but isn't shown actually casting spells innately: he always makes potions or gadgets or reads spells off of scrolls. that kinda sounds like a UMD based alchemist to me with an obsession towards hunting fairies. Thoughts?

let no one say that spell is weak

just be sure to be level 10-12 before you try using it lol. it's one of those late bloomer spells that's only worth it's slot if you're high level

(the dragon crit failed the save against my blood arcanist's potent magic ice spears and the monstrous cmb bonus it gets from having multiple spears tripped it. and by the time it's turn came back around, the martials had it surrounded and it was too scared to get up because of risk of opportunity attacks so it just started vomiting it's breath weapon before my character casted the same spell again twice over and got the last hit because it was weak to cold damage )

they kinda seem androgynous and hermit like but does the guide or manual or any other out of game source refer to their gender in any concrete way?

(I don't think it's an issue btw I'm just curious. It's kinda cool if the answer is literally just "beast master")

it's that the legal system is completely incapable of handling the undead