Drow Palemaster Build

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Underdork
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Drow Palemaster Build

Post by Underdork »

So a friend of mine is interested in playing a drow palemaster.

I don't really know what kind of build makes a palemaster tick so any guidance would be supah cool.

But from what I know of the build so far, they're leaning towards a Wizard/ Palemaster with my advice being that if they're going heavy on the palemaster, go for 19 or 20 PM for winterwight.

Any other insight for them in building their palemaster would be appreciated. Especially in terms of feats because I have no idea beyond that only Necromancy is worthwhile in terms of spell focuses.
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Alcomancer
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Re: Drow Palemaster Build

Post by Alcomancer »

Gonna ask Misterlich to chime in here, right now he's the resident PM guy. Drow get a nice bump because of their +int and native SR right now so they make excellent PMs.
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Raua
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Re: Drow Palemaster Build

Post by Raua »

Standard spreads are 10 Wizard/19 Palmaster/1 Bard (or, in descending order of preference, ranger, or rogue, or monk--Or whatever gives you tumble)
Alternatively 13 Wizard/16 Palemaster/1 Bard (or etc..)

First one being the "standard" for Winterwight and the best Palemaster abilities, while the latter build lets you select some higher-level spells that are harder (or impossible) to find as scrolls.

Focusing INT, is always what you want as a Wizard, and that's the same for a Palemaster. CON is always important for durability, and DEX is as well depending on what armor you use, but there's a decent amount of flexibility there.

But ML is Palemaster obsessed, so he can tell me I'm wrong ;D
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MisterLich
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Re: Drow Palemaster Build

Post by MisterLich »

I /think/ you can take the winterwight with the 13/16/1 build, your pale master arm just becomes slightly less effective. At least, nothing is written down that I can find, that says you have to have 18+ PM to get winterwight.

If you go less than 16 PM, you start losing AC, and a bonus feat. You get bonus epic feats for PM at 13, 16, and 19. That's part of why I rebuilt Kael to go 19 PM - essentially gained a free epic feat.

You should have at least 14 CON on a PM, and I encourage you to fit toughness on your build and try to max out your CON on your gear. You will be the envy of the party with your hp. Kael has 16 base CON now and has toughness, and with max CON and vampiric touch I get over 500 hp. It's pretty silly.

I highly recommend fitting saves feats, my build on Rob's building discord has this feat progression (Kael replaces all the saves feats with crafting and Spellcraft feats, for fun and flavor, so he is far from optimal):

1 (Human bonus): Strong Soul
1: Spell focus: Necromancy
3: Lightning Reflexes OR Brew Potion
6: Expertise
9: Improved Expertise
12: Greater Spell Focus: Necromancy
15: Great Fortitude OR Craft Wand
15 (Wizard bonus): Extend Spell
18: Toughness
20 (Wizard bonus): Maximize Spell
21: Great INT
23 (Palemaster bonus): Epic Spell Focus: Necromancy
24: Epic Reflexes
26 (Palemaster bonus): Epic Spell: Greater Ruin
27: Epic Spell: Epic Mage Armor
30: Epic Spell: Hellball
30 (PM bonus): Epic Spell: Epic Dragon Knight OR Epic Spell: Epic Mummy Dust



DEX is fun but really only useful for saves on a PM, you won't be lacking AC no matter what you do, but if you can manage to get 20 buffed DEX you will be able to max out your AC with spellsinger chain, which is fun. You can get a 16+ PM build with EMA up to 81-82 AC without armor skin.

Really, your only threats gameplay-wise on a PM, are people with SR (even just SR items, because your non-necromancy has a CL of 10, which sucks big sweaty balls :'( ), or people that somehow get AB that reaches into the 70's during knockdown, which... I'm not even really sure exist. Your other main threat are competent casters. Rosary has beaten Kael'thas in 4 out of 4 times we've fought, in varying circumstances, lol, but she's also just hyper-competent to be fair. You should become familiar with greater sanctuary and always keep a scroll or three of them around so you can get out of sketchy situations without being counterspelled by someone clever enough to realize they can counterspell you.



That's my generic advice! Anything specific you wanna ask about?
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Alcomancer
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Re: Drow Palemaster Build

Post by Alcomancer »

I'm rob when he mentions a Rob
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Theander
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Re: Drow Palemaster Build

Post by Theander »

Thank you for the response!

I'm the guy making the drow PM in question. Right now I'm looking at 3 Rogue, 11 Wiz, 16 PM. 3 Rogue simply because I like having a massive skill pool for RP purposes so I have taken one at level 1 and will take the others at 17 and 27. The feat-list in particular is of massive interest to me simply becaues I wasn't sure at all what to get, what to build towards, etc. About the only thing I knew about was that winterwights existed and I didn't know if that was an epic feat or the result of just levelling up.

I'm probably going to have to rebuild eventually. Currently my character has Dex 16 and Con 6 (I have Str 12 because I didn't want to be annoyed by encumberance rules in particular) which by the sound of it is the opposite of what I should have.

Also, hi Rob.
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speedgrab
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Re: Drow Palemaster Build

Post by speedgrab »

If i remember right you need a necromancy caster level of 32 to get the Winter wight. So a mixed 29 levels of Arcane caster class+palemaster, along with their +3 bonus on a palemaster casting create greater undead, gets you the winterwight.
Source: viewtopic.php?p=2048#p2048

So you can only have one level of non Arcane Caster/palemaster class if you still want the winterystabbalot

Extra Source: Played a 19 Wizard / 10 Palemaster / 1 Fighter at one point.
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MisterLich
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Re: Drow Palemaster Build

Post by MisterLich »

Re: Winterwight, Speedgrab is correct.

6 CON is going to make you cry, on any character. You will need, need, need, to have toughness, and max out your CON.

12 STR as a quality of life decision isn't a bad idea. 8 STR is pretty shit, and if I get hit with negative energy burst and my STR gets lowered, I'm gonna be encumbered immediately.


Unfortunately, you will not get the winterwight with your build, as speedgrab says.
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Theander
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Re: Drow Palemaster Build

Post by Theander »

Darn. That means I have to pick between being a skill-monkey and having a powerful summon. I guess the RP is still the same but still, shame.
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Raua
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Re: Drow Palemaster Build

Post by Raua »

Trust me, you won't be starved for skills! xD
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Re: Drow Palemaster Build

Post by The1Kobra »

Since this build is INT focused as well as getting bonus INT from being drow, you certainly will not be starved on skill points. You definitely want at least 29 levels of wizard+PM for the winter wight. If you want the rogue skills, you can still make it work, just grab your rogue level in epic and while you won't have them for a while, you will have them in the end. Just be sure to take shield proficiency pre-epic since rogue won't get it while bard does, and there are 0 ASF shields out there.
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Re: Drow Palemaster Build

Post by Theander »

It's less about the amount of skill points more the spread on where they can go. So I suppose one level of rogue or bard is fine but it just means a lot of my skill points will be floating until right near the end of the build, so I'll spend a LOT of time without some of the skills I want to RP with.

I can't find anything on the Winterwight in the normal NWN wiki, so I assume it's an Amia thing? I do like the idea of having a powerful undead companion, other than my skeletal familiar, can I get more details on it?
Theander
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Re: Drow Palemaster Build

Post by Theander »

If I didn't go full Palemaster, is there a good build for Bard/RDD/Palemaster? Or Wizard/Palemaster/Shadowdancer? I am not a big fan of bard but I wanted my character to be from Chaulssin, who are shadow dragon drow and I was wondering how well I could reflect that via the build.
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speedgrab
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Re: Drow Palemaster Build

Post by speedgrab »

Re: Winterwight?

All Amias summons have been reworked. In depth details aren't released to the players. Winterwight is one of the strongest summons available to players. I personally would not want to miss out on it!

Re: bard RDD Pale
Can't comment on this one myself, only heard of people playing it, not in practice. I'd imagine it plays a lot more like a defensive spellswordy type, but limited with easy dispelling and durations?

Re: Wizard Pale Shadowdancer
Hide in plain sight is now level 6 Shadow dancer on Amia to stop 1 level dips. This means no Winterwight which would be a big part of you offensivly. 10 pl, 6 Shadow dancer means only 16 wizard to really play about offensivly / buffs. (26 caster level on necromancy though)
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Theander
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Re: Drow Palemaster Build

Post by Theander »

Yeah. Every RDD/Palmaster build I've seen online is a 40 level build, so not quite as useful as I'd like. Thanks for the tip regarding Shadowdancer, I think I remember that from when I was last on Amia... 10 years ago or so. It's been a while. :p
Theander
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Re: Drow Palemaster Build

Post by Theander »

Will details on the summons be released to the players? For example I can currently summon a Mohrg, but given Mohrgs are normally CR12 I am assuming it has been adjusted down somewhat as I'm currently a level 8 character. On the flip side I picked the skeleton summon but have only a limited idea how it upgrades over time (I assume my PM levels stack for purposes of familiar's power?)
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The1Kobra
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Re: Drow Palemaster Build

Post by The1Kobra »

If you want a RDD/Palemaster, that's a melee build. I've seen some in the past. The main thing with them is that while they get a huge amount of AC, they struggle with their AB. Bard levels don't count towards the PM summons so they don't have that, and on Amia you need 20 in your casting stat to get epic spells. Investing in 20 CHA on an RDD build is possible, but you're detracting heavily from your STR which you'll need to hit stuff.

If you want a Palemaster tank build? I recommend bard/PM/Blackguard. Huge AC, decentish AB, and a good devcrit makes for a mean package.
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Re: Drow Palemaster Build

Post by Theander »

It's less about having a melee build more about having something that reflects the character I'm trying to build. A powerful build is great but a powerful build that goes against the character means I need to change the character to suit the build, or ignore the build when playing the character.

I'm probably just going to rebuild for 29 caster level 1 rogue, with either 16 or 19 pm.

On that note, based on what people have said here, I should probably redo my attributes. When applying for a rebuild do I get to repick my attributes as well? Or is it just a flat delevel and relevel with experience?
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Alcomancer
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Re: Drow Palemaster Build

Post by Alcomancer »

So something to point out here. Going high-level pale master is only really good for wizards. The abilities Pale Master gets are explicitly INT based and wizards use INT as their primary caster stat so they have a natural synergy. Those abilities give you some of your main utility since otherwise, the only spells that do anything for you on amia are your necromancy spells.

View Amia's Pale Master changes here to see the abilities and DCs therein.

As for the winterwight, amia has an entirely custom list of summons exclusive to pale master. Winterwight is the amian Pale Master's capstone summon at current and requires you to have a 29 combined caster level between wizard and pale master levels to achieve. Amia pale masters get a bonus to caster level when using their class inherent abilities.

Click me to view the amian pale master summons post

Theander there's more that it sounds like you have concerns regarding but I'm a little confused as to what they are so I'd like to take some time to come talk to you on discord in game. Feel free to shoot me a tell on amia if you see Gerald Edmund on the server list or message me on discord if you ever want too. I'm Alchomancer on the amia discord, or Metal Viking Guy#5433

I feel like you might misunderstand a few things about what you want to do with pale master vs what you can do as a pale master. And I feel like they might not be as exclusive as you think. I'd like to clear a couple of things up and help you but the forums are leaving me somewhat confused as to what you mean. Hearing and explaining one on one might be easier.


---


On a side note: For a pale master I seriously recommend going bard instead of rogue so that you can get yourself discipline ranks that will drastically increase your survival. Bards get very similar skills to pale masters as well. The other option would be to go monk at level 30 which would give you access to evasion but I doubt you're going Lawful Evil as a drow. Of all the options presented monk would definitely be the strongest choice for you but your RP would definitely be better suited to just taking bard.
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Galenson
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Re: Drow Palemaster Build

Post by Galenson »

It would be so much easier if Donkey wasn't colour blind...

...and if NWN actually allowed palemasters to accrue spell levels and caster levels like they're supposed to.
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