A few questions about Nenio + Ember levelling up

[tordlin]

Hi guys.

I am planning to switch Ember and Nenio in Loremasters.

A. Ember ->
a. Buffs individual for many party members (Mage armour + heroism + death ward + Barkskin (reschedule buffs from Camellia who will be replaced by Sosiel in act 3) + Greater heroism + etc)
b. Hexes + crowd controll spells for 3/4 of a game
c. Improve rays damage


Have some questions for you:
1. Does Expanded Arsenal (Magic School) work only with current state or with further improvement of the highest school?
For now I think to start Ember as conjurer for crowd controller (which also role playing relevant with her healing skills and preaching:)) except personal hexes for bosses in first half or 2/3 of a game. Also I need to give her some metamegic (5 or 7 level probably) and skill feat (9 level) for Loremaster. So it mean I have only 1 free feat which I think to spend on Focus Conjuration school. And later (11 level) take Greater focus for it.
Also first two mythic levels I`ll spend for enduring spells. And 3rd Mythic feat will be at 10 level for me.
So if I take Expanded Arsenal (Magic School - Evocation - 10 level) earlier than Greater focus Conjuration(11 level) will in be counted for future Evocation school? Will I have Greater focus Evocation bonus at 11 level when I take Greater focus Conjuration?

2. Should I need to wait 15 level for Hellfire ray be available for me by here Blackened or It wiil be also useful to us it since 12 level when I can choose it during level up?

11 level feat for Great focus Conjuration -> and GF Evocation by Expanded Arsenal
13 level feat Spell Penetration
15 level feat Greater Spell penetration -> start using Hellfire rays (3 rays per cast)

I think that game design of Ember panned in this way. What do you think?

3. I plan to have 10 SW + LM + 1level of ??? What do you suggest? Cross blooded sorcerer for...?

4. For what do I need spend secrets for her?
a. Druid - barkskin
b. Fighter - Greater weapon focus - rays
Others?

5. Metamegic on 5 or 7 level Bolster? Does it make sense for her in case she will use rays just only on 15 level? Other ideas for metamagic which could be relevant for 3/4 of the game? Selective for Web< Glitterdust, etc...?

B. Nenio ->
a. Buffs - communal (animal)
b. CC by Illusion and Enchtment school
c. Phantasmal Killer

Questions:
1. Same as Ember about Expanded Arsenal (Magic School).
If I take Expanded Arsenal (Magic School - Enchantment- 10 level) earlier than Greater focus Illusion(11 level) will in be counted for future Enchantment school? Will I have Greater focus Enchantment bonus at 11 level when I take Greater focus Illusion?

2. Which metamagic feat do I need for Loremaster? Selective don`t needed for first lelvels. Enchantment I`ll start to use only on 11 level looks like. Any ideas?

3. In case of Ember will take Camellia`s barkskin from secrets. What do you suggest to Nenio from Secrets? Animal Growth if Arueshalae won`t be able to have 4 spell slots for this itme.

4. I think to take her abundant casting only on 4 and 5 mythic levels. Any thoughts? I believe with enduring spell neither she nor Ember ( probably don`t need at all -> she will take ascendent element on 4 mythic level because she won`t use much rays till this time) don`t need abundant casting till level 11 (Greater spell focus + Phantasmal Killer)
1. Enduring spell
2. Greater enduring spell
3. Expanded Arsenal (Enchantment)

5. 10 level Scroll servant + 9 level Loremaster + 1 level of ???

[Soul]

im pretty sure that it'll be ok to take expanded aresenal feat before having both.... havent tested it myself but pretty sure its fine.... mainly because I dont see posts complaining about something like that pretty much....

buy a red salamander ring..... earliest you can buy one is in Act 2 from healer.... then Act 3 from that healer by the church.... that ring will actually let you cast hellfire ray... if you wanna learn the spell itself though make sure you unequip the ring first so it dont block you from learning the spell...

for my main sorcerer I always take metamagic bolster early levels like 5th... also selective metamagic early on is great....

selective metamagic is king of early game CC.... take Act 1 tavern defense.... I can place multiple selective grease spells down in the right spots and have total map control.... or in ambushes that are obvious I can place selective grease right on top of my party before interacting with a trigger for ambush....

also bolster is great early on too.... especially with snowball spell.... its a damage spell that requires no spell resistance check.... which is great till you can get the gear and such to break through spell resistance checks...

also animal growth is an arcane spell as well... meaning Nenio can cast it just fine normally...

[Draken]

@Soul does selective work for Grease? The description says that selective only works for spells with the instantaneous duration.
So it actually shouldn't work for a lot of longer duration CC spells like Glitterdust, Web, Grease...

[tordlin]

Soul, thank for answers.

Does it make any sense to have hellfire day earlier than 15 level?
Hellfire ray without 3 rays and without great penetration. Somewhere in 12-14 level of mine in mid act 3?

And if I take selective feat I will be able to take bolster only somewhere near 17 level.

[Soul]

Originally posted by Draken:

@Soul does selective work for Grease? The description says that selective only works for spells with the instantaneous duration.
So it actually shouldn't work for a lot of longer duration CC spells like Glitterdust, Web, Grease...

it works with grease and web....

before the defense of defenders heart starts... I like to have my main sorcerer run around and plant selective grease and web where enemies will spawn... THEN start the event through Irabeth... combat starts and all enemies have to roll 2 saving throws for web and grease... because they last minute per level... at level 6 thats 6 minutes.... so plenty of time for the CC to last the whole defense fight...

[Soul]

Originally posted by tordlin:

Soul, thank for answers.

Does it make any sense to have hellfire day earlier than 15 level?
Hellfire ray without 3 rays and without great penetration. Somewhere in 12-14 level of mine in mid act 3?

And if I take selective feat I will be able to take bolster only somewhere near 17 level.

with the red salamander ring on... you can have Ember cast hellfire ray as early as level 12... all she has to do is have spells per day for 6th level spells and she can cast it...

it even counts if your a pure crossblooded sorcerer.... like level 12 you are penalized as a crossblooded sorcerer to not learn the first new spell of that level... BUT... you do gain spells per day though for that level even if you dont know any new spells... which the ring would grant you hellfire ray even though you didnt learn new spells at level 12...

if you had spell specialization feat for hellfire ray by level 12... you'd be casting it as if your caster level 15... meaning by level 12 you'd be dealing 2 rays at 15d6 each...

[Yannir]

Originally posted by Draken:

@Soul does selective work for Grease? The description says that selective only works for spells with the instantaneous duration.
So it actually shouldn't work for a lot of longer duration CC spells like Glitterdust, Web, Grease...

No, that's not what it means. Some descriptions in the game suffer from a thing I call TT-ghosts where a feat description, etc. is taken straight from the TT entry without regard if the thing it describes is actually implemented or not. Non-instantaneous spells are among those. There just aren't any in the game.

"Instantaneous" just means that the used spell doesn't trigger on a delay like a trap or a ward that triggers when something walks into it. Which is a completely pointless description for this game.

Selective metamagic works on all AoE spells in the game. Selective Tsunamis, Polar Midnights or Siroccos are pretty effective control tools even in high levels.

[Draken]

Originally posted by Yannir:

Originally posted by Draken:

@Soul does selective work for Grease? The description says that selective only works for spells with the instantaneous duration.
So it actually shouldn't work for a lot of longer duration CC spells like Glitterdust, Web, Grease...

No, that's not what it means. Some descriptions in the game suffer from a thing I call TT-ghosts where a feat description, etc. is taken straight from the TT entry without regard if the thing it describes is actually implemented or not. Non-instantaneous spells are among those. There just aren't any in the game.

"Instantaneous" just means that the used spell doesn't trigger on a delay like a trap or a ward that triggers when something walks into it. Which is a completely pointless description for this game.

Selective metamagic works on all AoE spells in the game. Selective Tsunamis, Polar Midnights or Siroccos are pretty effective control tools even in high levels.

Good to know. Thanks for the information. :)

[tordlin]

So looks like there aren`t enough feats to build Ember as a good conjurer for 2/3 game and range touch attack master for second part of the game. I need to choose. We will see.

What about spending 1 free level? Sorcerer? Which one?

[Soul]

Originally posted by tordlin:

So looks like there aren`t enough feats to build Ember as a good conjurer for 2/3 game and range touch attack master for second part of the game. I need to choose. We will see.

What about spending 1 free level? Sorcerer? Which one?

if your gonna dip into sorcerer go crossblooded for the double bloodline class feature.... like elemental bloodline gets the ability to convert all energy spells into its elemental type... and dragon bloodline gets to add +1 per die to spells that match its element....

both of those work together....

[tordlin]

Thank you, Soul.

[Razer]

Wouldn't take the sorcerer level too early. Hardly any benefit and you're delaying your spell casting. If elemental focus is important do note that Blackwater dungeon has gloves that turn all your damage into electric. So you don't need the sorcerer for that per se. It's an alternative. Extra damage die is nice of course, but you have to think about whether its worth losing a spell casting level for it. Note that the lower your caster level, the easier enemies can dispell your buffs.

[Draken]

I agree with Razer.
If you have Ember mainly cast Hellfire Ray for damage, there isn't really a reason for taking Elemental Bloodline. Ascendant Elemental should be enough.

You also don't need to wait until Hellfire Ray to start blasting with her. She got some nice lower level fire rays earlier so picking up Ascendant Elemental Fire can help there as well. The option to have your buffer/CCer just blast something if you need just a little bit more damage is very nice.

One thing for the Loremaster secret, does Weapon Specialization actually work on Rays? +2 damage per Ray might be better than the + attack role from Weapon Focus.

[Razer]

Does secret ignore feat requirements? If not then you shouldn't even be able to pick fighter only feats like weapon spec.

[Draken]

Originally posted by Razer:

Does secret ignore feat requirements? If not then you shouldn't even be able to pick fighter only feats like weapon spec.

Pretty sure it does, yes. Otherwise the OP wouldn't have suggested taking Greater Weaponfocus Ray. That requires fighter levels as well.

[Soul]

Originally posted by Draken:

Originally posted by Razer:

Does secret ignore feat requirements? If not then you shouldn't even be able to pick fighter only feats like weapon spec.

Pretty sure it does, yes. Otherwise the OP wouldn't have suggested taking Greater Weaponfocus Ray. That requires fighter levels as well.

it does ignore prerequisites.... some ppl have used it to get shatter defenses without taking the prerequisites of weapon focus and dazzling display...