Shape Soulmeld

Sometimes, to try and keep things fresh, Wizards would introduce a new system as an option for players to tack onto their game. Rather than simply having every splatbook just be new feats, new prestige classes, new spells and new items, they would try to coax players via a whole new subsystem. You've got your psionics, your invocations, your weaboo fighting magic. In subsequent years, said systems would get varying degrees of support.... seemingly at random. But the crack team at Wizards would be canny enough to recognize that at any given time, many enfranchised players were elbows-deep in some big campaign, and they're not going to simply fire up a brand new character to accommodate this whole new concept being presented! Thus, there would often be a compromise for those who came late: a feat that lets a character dip their toe in the new subsystem and at least sample one of the many new flavours on offer. Psionics have Wild Talent, maneuvers have Martial Study, and incarnum - perhaps the most opaque system of them all - can be sampled via the Shape Soulmeld feat.

Magic of Incarnum is rather notorious for being difficult to understand (Vecna knows I didn't grasp it on my first or second reading.) This is owing both to the complex nuances of the mechanic as well as... regrettably poor editing. Having said that, you of course need not understand every aspect of the system if you're just dipping your toe in via Shape Soulmeld! This article will be written with the assumption that you are not piloting a dedicated meldshaper, but rather have a more standard character build that's just window shopping with a single feat slot to spare. Having said that, the possibilities available from the Shape Soulmeld feat mean it's very much worth considering on any build with the slot to spare. Thought Planar Touchstone was versatile? Shape Soulmeld has it beaten handily!

Planar Touchstone

It can be agonizing selecting the right feats. Never mind the fact that the average character gets a mere seven of them over the course of a full adventuring career - you also have to worry about when their payoff is. What's better: the feat that's useful now but negligible at high level? Or the feat that's useless because it's just a prerequisite for something really juicy down the line? Neither sounds particularly attractive, and while you might recall that a casting of heroics or mirror move can score you bonus feats at a moment's notice, not all of us can cast wizard spells, thank you very much. Is there some feat that can not only be tooled to virtually any build, spellcaster or not, but also can be swapped out or updated so there's no point in the campaign in which it loses its luster?

You might be expecting you'll have to look pretty far afield to find such a lofty feat. You'd be right - in fact, you're going to have to look on whole other planes of existence. Today we're discussing Planar Touchstone, the feat that asks of you more than most, but may well be worth it in return.

Fling Ally

Convinced that the Book of Nine Swords is the only place where you might find obscene, cartoonish maneuvers that prioritize Rule of Cool over practicality? Races of Stone gives us the feat "Fling Ally" for the fans of the Fastball Special, which lets you hurl an ally smaller than you as though that ally was a ranged weapon with an incredibly terrible range. Funny imagery, but not very practical. Where do we go from here?

Well, the Epic Level Handbook contains Distant Shot, an epic level feat that lets you perform the epic level task of throwing or firing a ranged weapon against any target within line of sight. See where I'm going with this now?

Spell Component Pouch of Holding

A spell component pouch contains an infinite number of live spiders.

Phantom Trap

No matter how long you've been playing this game, no matter how many times you've reread the Player's Handbook, I find there's always some obtuse spell you've never seen before. Case in point: I recently stumbled across a core spell called phantom trap that I swear I've never laid eyes on. Unlike a lot of these obscure and worthless spells that crop up now and then, however... this one I kind of wish I had. It's strange, so strange that I'm having trouble thinking of any real, practical applications for such a spell. That said, it is worth investigating by virtue of how unique it is - and likely more for the DM than any of the players. The text for phantom trap is as follows:

Art Object Database

"Satisfied with a job well done at the end of an arduous dungeon, you pry open the old treasure chest to find... uh... seven +1 longswords!"

This is extending an olive branch to all of those DMs out there. When you're selecting (or rolling up) treasure for the party, do things not feel a little too... unrealistic? Using the tables provided in the Dungeon Master's Guide, and other published books, will lead to player characters mostly finding coins and gems, with some magic items when you're feeling generous. Who are all these dungeon-dwellers that mindlessly stockpile wealth in amounts perfectly divisible by 4, though? Wouldn't it make more sense to spend some of that coin? That said, it's never been the case for the wealthy to only spend on practical items. Not every one of someone's possessions are going to be potions, oils and magic weapons. Having egregious shows of wealth is the whole point of being wealthy!

In comes the second problem, though. The DMG does have a tidy table of art objects that can be found as part of treasure, for a neat alternative to raw monetary units. Said table, however, is woefully sparse - especially as a party approaches the higher levels, where the only pieces of art in circulation are gold rings and gold cups. Just how many nonmagical gold rings could one guy be reasonably expected to have?

Here then, I have an answer to your sparse and unrealistic treasure woes.

The One-Man Party

Dungeons & Dragons is a social game built around the core concept of the adventuring party. To that end, the various threats and obstacles throughout an adventuring day necessitate a variety of skill sets. One party member can bash down doors and cross swords with burly foes, another can pick locks and disable traps, a third can cast spells and, uh... do everything the first two do as well as much more. Nonetheless, the point stands: if you want to get far in this world, you'll need some friends with different class features before long.

Such is the conventional wisdom, anyway. But we here are all about bucking trends. Wouldn't it be exciting to try and have a single character be as versatile as possible to try and fill every party role? I'm not saying he or she has to be just as good at doing everything a complete party is, merely well enough to have a fair shot at any demand the adventuring world may throw at him. There's a certain tidiness (and thrill) to running a one-man party: how different does the D&D game feel when it's just one player and the DM? Imagine not having to share any loot from a treasure horde or XP from a fight. Imagine never having to argue about where to go or what needs to be done. Plus, it's the only way to experience one of my favourite adventure modules from a conceptual viewpoint: Jacob's Well.

So what sort of class is suited to take on such a demanding role? Perhaps it's tempting to take one or two levels of several different classes, hoping to score the most fundamental aspects of their class features and thus being able to do a little of everything. Your base attack bonus, spell progressions and general effectiveness at any one thing are going to suffer mightily for it, though. Surely it would be more elegant (and no doubt effective) to try and tick all the boxes while still staying in one base class!

Goblin Mini-Guide

I'm no Mons Johnson, but I'm going to say it: I really like goblins. I like the goofy, self-destructive, idiot savant medieval-steampunk-mad-scientists who are there for comic relief. I like the noble, misunderstood humanoid race facing ostracization because they've been labelled "evil." Hell, I even like the sexy little green women that seem to have been popularized by World of Warcraft. So imagine my disappointment, then, when they turned out to be such a bust in Dungeons & Dragons.

The thing is, goblins weren't really meant for player use, and it shows. While they have a +0 level adjustment, which is probably to be expected, their statblock also notes that "goblins with levels in NPC classes have a CR equal to their character level -2" (as opposed to the usual NPC's -1.) So really they're intended to be evil but weak little foes with some character levels that might be familiar. A level 3 goblin warrior or adept will have a CR of 1, but don't expect to play a level 3 goblin adept and have it count as a level 1 character.

I'm going to go off on a brief tangent here and lament the fact that goblins perhaps had the problem of not quite being bad enough. I mean, they come up a little short as far as player character races go, but it's not by a lot. Consider the kobold, however: another weak, evil 'NPC race,' the kobold is probably inferior to even the goblin, with its stat modifiers providing an overall net loss of -4. They were seen as so weak that Wizards stepped in and provided plenty of support material for them, from an entire chapter in Races of the Dragon that provided all sorts of kobold-specific feats and alternate class features, to a tailor-made web enhancement article that just threw in four more racial traits for free, not to mention a feat that increases your goddamn caster level. Most discussion of kobolds nowadays centers around how overpowered they often are in practice, with the poorly-thought-out Dragonwrought feat and various spellcasting boosts made available to kobolds alone. This is, of course, in addition to the various subraces printed since then that allow for superior stat modifiers depending on your build. There are no doubt a number of players who are blissfully unaware of the fact that the kobold was ever seen as a weak point in need of shoring up. See what I mean? The kobold is so weak that the squeaky wheel gets the grease, whereas the long-suffering goblin is just decent enough that it can be completely ignored in a system that prints books at the drop of a hat.

Battle Jump

If it hasn't already been made abundantly clear, you can do some pretty silly things thanks to the Book of Nine Swords. Really it has no shortage of silliness within its very pages, but sometimes you can get a really spiffy effect by combining the new offerings for marshal adepts with an abusable piece of minutae from a previous splatbook.

Mirror Move

In D&D, it can be tempting to try and do everything. You want to have all these spells, and these prestige classes, and these feats, and even these various skill ranks... yes, it can be tricky to fit everything that catches your eyes into a single build. But what if you were able to sub in what you want when you want it now and then? You might not be able to trade out class levels on the fly, but whenever you see someone using a cool feat, do you not think to yourself "I wish I could try that"?

Well if you're willing to look way back to a dubious little corner of an unofficial web article, you just might be able to try that.

Mirror move is a 2nd level bard/wizard spell that allows you to make like Taskmaster and copy any physically demonstrable feat that you see. If you're wondering why you haven't seen nor heard of this admittedly funky spell, it's because it's from a somewhat dubious source - a web article published in 2001 that was never subsequently included in a book, updated for 3.5, or otherwise mentioned again. Yes, the same source as guidance of the avatar and other suspect tidbits. Still, it was published by Wizards, so if your DM doesn't mind you can have some fun with this one.

If it wasn't obvious already, I have a deep love for open-ended feats and spells. Having a single option that can be tooled to the current situation rewards creativity and inventiveness without demanding perfect foresight or having an overabundance of niche options prepared "just in case." After all, you can rarely be certain of what you'll come across in any given day of your adventuring career, let alone while adventuring in general, so having a multi-tool can keep you from being caught with your pants down. Unlike a lot of the usual "cast this and pick what you want" sorts of spells, though, mirror move functions a little differently.

Firepower

Not all things are created equal, a tacit fact that is again and again reinforced by the mechanics of Dungeons & Dragons. The fighter can never hope to keep up with the wizard as levels ramp up, and everything a monk can do a swordsage can do better. Even in less fundamental aspects of the game, this can creep in: just ask any melee character who has tried to use a sword and shield versus a two-handed weapon. Indeed, even something as seemingly flavourful as energy types suffer from this. Don't believe me? Compare how many monsters resist sonic damage versus those that resist fire.

At the top of this pyramid of supremacy, force damage is the way and the path. Essentially nothing resists or is immune to force damage, asides from the (very epic-level) force dragon. A few spells and items make a particular call-out for magic missile spells. Next there is the second-tier of energy types: unusual call-outs like holy damage (a la flame strike,) and desiccation damage (a la desiccate.) Very rarely are these going to be resisted or affected in any way: they're virtually "typeless" the way force damage often is. That said, they're also very uncommon. Third tier belongs to sonic damage, which is the most effective of the "core" energy types. Fourth tier holds acid and electricity, in that order, and the bottom tier holds cold damage and lastly fire.

This hierarchy is in no way official or rigid: it's just a vague guideline I've determined from observation. It simply means that putting aside the setting, environment or pre-established foes, if you prepare an acid spell instead of an otherwise-identical fire spell, you're less likely to run across a foe who will be resistant or immune to it. 3d6 acid damage isn't "better" than 3d6 fire damage, there have just been more creatures with fire resistance that have been printed. Demons, devils, dragons, celestials: all the major players shrug off the effects of fire.

So why the imbalance? Is this just another matter of "X is better than Y, get over it"? Well... sort of. The thing is, the greater reliability of the higher-tier energy types often comes with an arbitrary balancing factor. This is perhaps best demonstrated in the orb of X line of spells. Orb of fire deals 1d6 fire damage per level (maximum 15d6) and makes the target save against dazing. Each orb has a different riding effect, though, so the orbs with a slightly better damage have slightly worse effects. For instance, orb of cold forces a save against blinding (not as impressive) and orb of acid a save against being sickened (a comparatively minor hindrance indeed.) Then you get to orb of sound, which can deafen the target (ho-hum) and deals only 1d4 damage per level. The fact it's dealing sonic damage is reason enough to lower the damage dice. Then lastly, there's orb of force, which has no secondary effect and tops out at a maximum of 10d6 damage, rather than 15.

So there isn't really an inherent pros-and-cons debate introduced by using force damage over fire damage, say, it's just that in many cases spells and effects will likely be balanced to somewhat favour the "worse" energy types in case-by-case bases. In addition, there are far more feats, class features and items to improve your cold and fire spells (take even a casual glance at Frostburn) than for, say, sonic or desiccation damage. This is an imperfect science, of course, but at least the effort is there.

If we know what energy types are "best" and which are "worst" (yet have the best spells,) what do we do with this knowledge? Well, fire damage may be much-maligned in general for its generally underperforming against a variety of enemies, but its humble status as the lowliest energy type has earned it the most published support. If all of this support material exists mostly to balance it out against the other types, though, why bother? Well, it would suddenly get a lot more impressive (and hey, interesting for roleplaying) if those shortcomings could be easily undone, wouldn't it?

Enter Searing Spell.

This little gem from Sandstorm does something very unusual - it makes your fire spells so supernaturally hot that they ignore all fire resistance and even still do half damage to creatures with fire immunity. What do you want to bet that a fire elemental has never felt what it's like to be burned before? As a nice bonus, a searing spell also does double damage to creatures with the cold subtype - which is on top of the double damage they were already taking from a fire spell. This peace of mind comes at the acceptable cost of a spell slot one level higher.

So now you can fling fire spells around with little worry for targeting restrictions. Sure, Energy Substitution already existed and doesn't even raise the spell's level, but what if you want to stick to fire spells thematically? A pyromaniac shouldn't have to shoot "coldballs" just because he's facing an efreet. More importantly, it's generally the case that if a monster has resistance to one energy type, it does to most of them, especially with Outsiders and at higher levels. It's also the case that changing the energy types of your spells won't let you reliably capitalize on its original energy type - something that can be very handy, as we're about to see.

So removing the biggest downside of fire damage is a real coup, but pumping the cost of all of your spells by one level is a pretty hefty cost. Is there enough support for fire damage that can make it worthwhile? Unshockingly, the answer is... perhaps!

Animate with the Spirit

Undeath is a pretty fun well to dip into, so long as you aren't actually drinking from it.

The thing is, it's a tricky and contentious brand of magic. The last couple of articles might have gotten you interested, but of course, it's not like just anyone can cast animate dead. (Sorry sword-swingers, before you get too excited, I'm not about to reveal a way for you to reanimate undead minions.) Animate dead is only for wizards and clerics, and worse still, the moral implications of even using such a spell are... suspect, at best. Being a heroic fantasy game, D&D characters are generally going to be good, and it can be hard to justify reanimating corpses with negative energy as a result. The problem is, naughty necromancers don't get any love from Santa come Christmastime. So how do capital-G-Good characters get in on the fun? And in the spirit of the season, can't rangers, druids and paladins also get a present while we're at it?

On the Proper Care and Maintenance of Undead

We can all take solace in the common struggle that we as human all face: we just want someone to boss around. That's probably a big draw for the fantasy escapism of D&D, but astonishingly even therein it's easier said than done. Pelor knows your party's an ornery bunch, and they'd rather shake down commoners for copper pieces than do anything you suggest. The Leadership feat is banned in some campaigns, and you have to be careful with your followers lest they become disenfranchised. Most campaigns don't run psionics (for you wannabe thrallherds out there) and planar binding can be a real hassle with all of the costs, exacting rules and opposed charisma checks. What's a power-hungry lunatic to do?

Fortunately, for any problem, we have undead. Order them around, use them for combat, hard labour, hat racks, you name it. They don't complain or disobey, and best of all, you don't even have to feed them. Ah, the wonders of magic. One casting of animate dead and you've got a contingent of skeletons ready to either kick ass or kiss ass, at your option.

...not that it's without its deficiencies, however. Having no intelligence or self-sufficiency feel like par for the course; I'm referring more to the fact that animate dead can get damned expensive, at 25 gp per hit die. One Turn Undead from an enemy cleric and that's all of your money and hard work wasted. Plus, there is a limit to how many you can command - 4 HD per level may sound like a lot, but the low hit points, saves and BAB of undead mean that most of the worthwhile options need HD as high as possible to make a dent.

So how can you ensure a reanimated legion is worthwhile? A gang of bloodthirsty corpses can pull apart most commoners with ease, but you're going to have to put in a little more effort than that if you hope to pit them against level-appropriate threats. Here, then, I have a short treatise on what corpses to aim for when reanimating, and how to best make use of them once they're active.

Haunt Shift

Halloween draws near, dear readers, and with it comes all manner of ghosts n' goblins. And ghouls and ghasts and goristros and gorillons and... uh, well, you get the picture. So with all of the restless spirits coming to roost, why not embrace the season and get in on a bit of the haunting yourself?

Necromancers have always been able to order around undead armies and generally bend entities of negative energy to their whims. But why settle for undeath by proxy? D12 hit dice and a list of immunities longer than your arm sounds like a good time for any spellcaster, but of course, trading in your meat bag for another, more gangrenous meatbag with an abysmal Fortitude save has its own disadvantages. Really, there's no reason to trifle with bodies at all - once you've crossed that hurdle into undeath, a mid-level spellcaster can make themselves a haunting presence, and go around possessing one item, Poltergeist-style. Of course, you're not just going to pick any Tom, Dick or grand piano off the street: if you get to possess an object and pilot it around, you might as well custom-make the best you can get.

Cheap Items

Being an adventurer isn't easy. Sure, there's the delving into moldy crypts, the sleeping rough, having to pick through lethal traps and of course regularly fighting for your life versus eldritch monstrosities. But asides from all that, it's expensive! Naturally there's fantastic wealth to be gained in the deal, which is going to be at least partly why your characters got themselves wrapped up in this whole business in the first place, but the cost of entry is substantial. Like that John Candy-lookin' guy from The Yukon Trail said, it takes money to make money. Generally your character's going to start with 100-odd gold pieces to spend, which is basically nothing to a seasoned adventurer but on the other hand more than enough for a commoner to retire with and live comfortably.

Regardless, you're gearing up to brave the unknown and cross blades with whatever the DM throws at you, so you'd better make sure your money's working for you. There are of course ways to get more than your fair share, but when that's not really an option, you ought to know where to look to get the most bang for your medieval buck. Collected here, then, I have several cost-effective items - some well-known, others more obscure - that can provide useful effects most adventurers need for 1000 gp or less. Special attention was paid to inexpensive items that can replace the common, more costly choices.

Traps

They prowl dungeons the world over, lurking around corners, behind locked doors and in treasure chests. They have no conscience to appeal to, no mind to reason with. Negative levels or ability drain won't so much as slow them down, and even no-save, no-SR spells like forcecage or maze won't do a thing. They can threaten any character, from level 1 all the way up to level 20, and take many forms. What deadly creature could this possibly be...?

Traps!

Yes, the staple of dungeon hazards, traps have been dutifully stabbing, poisoning, dropping, slicing, dicing and polymorphing-into-spaghetti-ing hapless adventurers since time immemorial. Generally they are something to suspect and avoid, to shove the rogue at in hopes of tasty XP before moving on. But in truth, traps are misunderstood creatures. Their name might inspire fear and caution in seasoned adventurers, but with a bit of kindness and a lot of gold, one can bend these gentle, beautiful, inanimate creatures to their own whims. With some careful set-up and some rather gross subversion of the game designers' expectations (as usual,) traps can be a source of immense power.

Prestidigitation

Think of that spell that lets you do anything you want.

Most magic has an effect that you have to make do with and apply to the situation at hand. You know the one, though: that spell that lets you perform any feat of your choice, without that choice being made when you prepared spells at the start of the day. All you need do is word what you want exactly and you can make it real.

Which spell were you thinking of? Wish? Miracle, perhaps? Forget those; too costly. I'm talking about the Level Zero Wish here - prestidigitation, baby!

Eternal Wands

Disposable magic items were always a moral dilemma for me. Investing in something that's single-use leaves you really intent on getting your money's worth out of that one usage. A scroll, for instance, can cost you a pretty penny but holds a spell you can only cast once. Thus, it's not uncommon (in my experience, anyway) to hold onto the item indefinitely, always convincing yourself that it's being saved for when you really need it. Even when you do really need it, you'll save it for when you really, really need it. In such a case, it ends up being wasted money. Most players are more comfortable buying a ring or a +1 weapon or some other item with a permanent and tangible benefit.


Wands are the beginnings of a compromise in that direction. With 50 uses before they're spent, they have a large enough store that players are usually comfortable spending charges when they're needed. However, 50 is indeed a finite number, and for wands that aren't holding severely specific spells, one that is liable to run out eventually. Until you've used all 50 of those charges, you haven't actually gotten your money's worth out of the item - and yet after you have used all 50, you no longer have anything to show for your spent gold!

So what's the real solution? Is there a way to comfortably spend money on an item that isn't yet another +1 to something on your character sheet? Can one make appropriate use of an activated item and still have something to show for it one or twenty levels later? Surely there's a way to take the utility of a wand and stretch it out a bit, isn't there?

Heroics

Feats are a precious resource: most characters get seven over the course of their entire career, with humans getting eight and fighters getting eleven more... but at the dire cost of having to be a fighter. That's not even taking feat taxes into account, with many of the more desirable prestige classes necessitating one or more feats that are otherwise of little to no use.

So how can you ensure your feats are working hard enough for you? In particular, more specific feats might have a strong effect, but they run the risk of being useless in most situations. Well, there is a rather simple way to not only get more feats, but to get them on-demand, picking up whatever suits the situation as you need it.

There's a little gem in the Spell Compendium called heroics - a level 2 sorcerer/wizard spell that lets you grant the subject a single feat off the list of fighter bonus feats for 10 minutes per level. Even at minimum level, that's half an hour to make use of your new feat. Having to be a fighter bonus feat is indeed a big restriction, especially from your viewpoint as a spellcaster - no crafting, no metamagic and nothing along the lines of spell focus, obviously. But if you look, you might be surprised by how extensive the list really is, often with bonus feats appended to it with every book. In particular, versatile feats that grant you choices gives you a 'feats-within-feats' situation that can be tooled to suit any character.

Items of Creation

It's said that half of an adventure's successes are determined beforehand in town. Actually, nobody's ever said that, but I figured it would lend some credence to my words if I make it sound like an established idea. Really though, asides from preparing spells (which only some of us get to do,) before every adventure it's wise to properly equip oneself. How can you be exactly sure what you need, though? Rope and torches are safe bets, but will you need a mirror? What about a shovel, or a crowbar, or chalk? How much easier would things be if you had antitoxin or holy water? Will there be a water hazard? A cliff wall to be scaled? A chasm too wide to cross...?

Forewarned is forearmed, but most of the time you'll ultimately be guessing at what obstacles you'll encounter, or simply settling for the most standard useful items and hoping ingenuity will take care of the rest. After all, it's not like you can afford to haul around every single mundane tool and semi-magic item in existence 'just in case.' Wouldn't it make things so much easier if you could, say, choose which items you brought after the fact? I'm not advocating for lying about what's written on your equipment list, but rather relying on a single item that can replace a whole suite of mundane tools on a whim!