Can I get some guidance building sylvan sorcerer

[Hexton]

Any knowledgeable caster players help me with building a Sylvan Sorcerer. Stats (high Cha got that), spell pick, feats? I guessing conjuration and ....

Will be first play through...I've started quit during intro couple times already...

[dwarfpcfan]

leopard and similodon are the best animal choices over all. The first trips and has awesome ac along with decent damage, the second has lots and lots of attacks per round with good damage.

spell focus conjuration+augment summoning are good feats if you're willing to invest in summoning spells.

beyond that combat casting if you expect to be forced into melee so your casting doesn't get interrupted. Spell penetration and greater spell are good choices later down the road when relevant levels of spell resistance on enemies start showing up

beyond that invest every point in charisma you get, get the best charisma enhancing items you can.

good spells by level:
level 1: Shield, Magic missle, Sleep, Summon monster
level 3: scorching ray, hideous laughter, mirror image, summon monster II
level 3: Stinking Cloud (the best low level crow control in the game if you know how to use it), fireball, hold person, displacement, Summon monster III
Level 4: Phantasmal Killer, Enervation, Summon Monster IV
Level 5: Cloudkill, Summon large elemental, hold monster
Level 6: summon huge elemental, chain lightning, baleful polymorph, disintergrate

[Hexton]

Hey Thanks dwarfpcfan!

Should I take both conjuration and greater conjuration and augment summoning as my first three picks in the beginning?

Can I have pet and a summon monster at the same time?

Does skills matter such as world knowledge (spelled right?), etc the things you pick on the left during creation.

[Der Mentat]

The build depends if you want to maximize damage or if your sorcerer should primarily use buffs, summons and crowd control spells.

For damage I’d recommend an Arcane Trickster build; in this case consider putting some attribute points into dexterity instead of charisma. Good feats are Point Blank Shot, Precise Shot, Acomplished Sneak Attack, Metamagic: Empower Spell, Metamagic: Maximize Spell, (Greater) Spell Penetration, Weapon Focus Ray, Critical Focus Ray, Spell Focus: Evocation, Spell Specialization. You can use Octavia as an Arcane Trickster too, though.

For a CC caster it’s important to increase the DC of spells so every attribute should go into charisma.
Conjuration has not only summon spells but also a lot of good crowd control spells, so (Greater) Spell Focus: Conjuration is definitely a great choice. With CC spells it’s advisable to target always the weakest enemy save IE you need different spells for different enemies: In Conjuration you have for example Stinking Cloud against Fortitude Saves, Chains of Light and Grease against Reflex Saves and Glitterdust against Will Saves.


My current Sylvan Sorcerer build looks like this:

Level 1:
Skill Focus: Persuasion (for the main character the persuasion skill is extremely useful, especially if he is charisma based)
Spell Focus: Conjuration (Sorcerer Bonus Feat)

Level 3:
Greater Spell Focus: Conjuration

Level 5:
Metamagic: Heighten Spell

Level 7:
Point Blank Shot
Precise Shot (Sorcerer Bonus feat)

Level 9:
Augmented Summoning

Level 11:
Superior Summoning

Level 13;
Spell Penetration
Improved Initiative/ Metamagic: Quicken Spell/ Dodge (Sorcerer Bonus feat)

Level 15:
Greater Spell Penetration

Level 17;
Metamagic: Extend Spell

(Btw the selection for Sylvan Sorcerer Bonus feats is very limited; for example if you pick Precise shot before level 7 you cannot take Augmented Summoning as Sorcerer Bonus feat there instead)


Spell Suggestions (for conjuration focus):

Level 1: Mage Armor, Shield, Grease
Level 2: Glitterdust, Mirror Image, Bulls Strength, Cats Grace (both for animal companion)
Level 3: Stinking Cloud, Heroism, Haste, Displacement
Level 4: Summon Monster, Controlled Fireball
Level 5: Animal Growth (only if you don't have the leopard as your animlal companion), Summon Monster, Cloud Kill, Constricting Coils
Level 6: Chains of Light, Greater Heroism, Summon Monster (Sirocco is good too but personally I prefer heightened Stinking Cloud, because of +2 DC in this build)

[Der Mentat]

Originally posted by Hexton:

Can I have pet and a summon monster at the same time?

You can even have several summons at the same time. At the beginning of the game they don't last very long though, so I usually start with summoning only around level 8.

Originally posted by Hexton:

Should I take both conjuration and greater conjuration and augment summoning as my first three picks in the beginning?

If you want to focus on summons at the beginning you actually don't need Greater Conjuration that early (it only increases DC), if you want to use mostly CC spells at the beginning you don't need Augment Summoning that early. However in the end all of them are good feats.

From my experience the most important spells for a Sylvan Sorcerer in act 1 are buffs (mostly Mage Armor and Bulls Strength for the pet, or Cats Grace for the leopard I guess). Grease can be very valuable in hard fights if you choose Greater Conjuration focus.

Originally posted by Hexton:

Does skills matter such as world knowledge (spelled right?), etc the things you pick on the left during creation.

Definitely pick persuasion. Otherwise it depends a bit on your companions. Octavia for example will be better in Knowledge checks (as they increase with intelligence).

[Hexton]

Thanks Der Mentat for the thorough response.

I suppose I was hoping I could do it all...

If I choose conjuration as main type of spell skill, it also add damage to my conjuration spell power/damage like snowball, mage armor etc ? So Conjuring offense spells should do good damage?

I'll probably follow your character then, since I really haven't played the game much, even though I'm a backer.

Your S Sorc, is summoning/CC build?

[Der Mentat]

Originally posted by Hexton:

If I choose conjuration as main type of spell skill, it also add damage to my conjuration spell power/damage like snowball, mage armor etc ? So Conjuring offense spells should do good damage?

The Spell Focus feats (like conjuration or evocation) don’t increase directly the damage. (There are some exceptions like Fireball that slightly benefit from it but the typical single target damage spells are not affected.) These feats basically only improve your chance that debuffs and CC spells that you cast aren’t resisted by the targets. Generally the difficulty class (DC) of your spells is calculated through the formula

DC = 10 + spell level + charisma modifier

Spell Focus increases this value by 1, Greater Spell Focus by 1 more. For summoning, damage spells or buffs Spell Focus doesn’t do much (except maybe unlocking additional feats).

Originally posted by Hexton:

I suppose I was hoping I could do it all...

Theroretically an Arcane Trickster can not only deal a lot of damage but also be a decent summoner and CC caster. (Arcane Tricksters get the additional damage mostly through Sneak Attack not through additional feats like Spell Focus). In reality though, spell slots are limited, so you usually try to fill them with as many ray spells as possible because that’s the main purpose of that class.

Besides, the main advantage of a Sylvan Sorcerer is of course his animal companion…

Originally posted by Hexton:

Your S Sorc, is summoning/CC build?

Yes, but at the beginning of the game her role is primarily buffing. In this stage a Sylvan Sorcerer may seem to be quite weak (similar to other casters) but thats totally compensated by your pet that tanks and does a lot of damage.

[Hexton]

Sounds good, thanks again...off to build my Pet Sorc!