what was the first ever character that you rolled & play
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Post Posted: Tue Feb 07, 2006 8:20 pm 
 

Yep, the old dagger, dart or staff choice. Darts are hard to pass up. Three attacks per round. Problem is you are never going to find magic darts and they are useless in hand to hand.

Daggers are probably the best choice; two attacks per round if throwing and you have something for hand to hand. You also have a higher chance of finding a magic dagger.

The staff does the best damage. That is it.

Non prof. is -5 and you get your second one at 6th level.


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Post Posted: Wed Feb 08, 2006 12:02 am 
 

The dagger is best for damage, magic item opportunity and melee, except my DM determined that thrown daggers had a higher chance of breakage than thrown darts since darts were meant to be thrown while thrown daggers were incidentally thrown, and therefore not designed to stand up to the pressure of multiple throws.  I was never quite sure of his logic as I'm not a weapons expert, but he was the DM so... his rule was the rule.  
The dagger does provide a magic-user with a hand-to-hand combat option but if the enemy is that close at hand to your magic-user you're probably doomed anyway and should look to run.
If I remember correctly, don't magic-users get a new weapon slot every six levels (1/6 I believe the PHB states), so doesn't that mean he gets a new weapon at 7th level (after completing the first six)?

  

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Post Posted: Wed Feb 08, 2006 8:07 am 
 

New weapon at 5 or 6 levels...Gives me a chance to pry open that dusty PHB and check :D

I generally picked either dagger or staff for my magic users. I would then load up on a few oil flasks and use them as my missile weapon of choice. A smart MU would buy a war dog as soon as he had enough cash and keep that puppy real close...

Funny how even a 4th level magic user would get crushed by a simple gnoll in hand to hand. Ah yes, the good old days when running was always in the tactical equation.


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Post Posted: Wed Feb 08, 2006 10:19 am 
 

Ah, yes, good ol' flasks of oil, they did come in handy.   :D
As for animal companions, my DM had it in for them every time.  I tried hawks and war dogs, and he'd snuff them out every time early in the adventure.  He just didn't like them for some reason; odd considering he had a beautiful collie that looked like Lassie.

  

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Post Posted: Wed Feb 08, 2006 4:45 pm 
 

Same here. Dogs and hawks had an incredibly short life span...So did my gold, for that matter. 8O


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Post Posted: Wed Feb 08, 2006 5:24 pm 
 

bbarsh wrote:Yep, throw your one spell and sit back and watch...the good old days...I love them.

Ah, first-level magic-users ... or we used to call them: "Walking Wands of Magic Missiles (1 use/day)." :)

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Post Posted: Wed Feb 08, 2006 7:35 pm 
 

Actually looked up magic-user weapon proficiencies in the PHB today, and it was 1 every 6 levels, so the poor MU had to wait to 7th level to get another weapon.  I guess a staff at that point would make sense just in case the DM gets generous and drops a Staff of Power someplace...

And also about the war dogs, my DM would roll to see if they barked in the dungeon at inopportune times, thus attracting wandering monsters...  :wink:

  

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Post Posted: Wed Feb 08, 2006 7:48 pm 
 

Mst of our 1st level MU's were Sleepwalkers. Out-of-dungeon they were of course Detect Magic and Identifiers.
I remember one campaign I DM'ed ages ago, the party went on several adventures and accumulated a fair number of potions and magic items. The MU always refused to spend the time necessary to ID the items in between adventures, so they just went unused. After the third adventure, when he refused, they locked him in an inn room with all the stuff, gave him a ton of small pearls, a huge skin of wine and a live frigging owl, and said he couldn't come out until he was done. They made him pass the items out the door as they got IDed. Took quite a while. Wow, was he pissed. Pissed enough to claim the ring of protection +2 was a ring of delusion, which he asked for since it was a magic item, albeit somewhat useless. He had a gem mounted on it, and wore it. No one ever knew. He also (and this was hilarious) drank a potion of healing and pissed in the bottle. Surprisingly enough, it didn't do much in the healing department when the thief drank it after suffering acid damage from a trap.

  

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Post Posted: Thu Feb 09, 2006 1:39 am 
 

VermilionFire wrote:Ah, yes, good ol' flasks of oil, they did come in handy.  :D
As for animal companions, my DM had it in for them every time. I tried hawks and war dogs, and he'd snuff them out every time early in the adventure. He just didn't like them for some reason; odd considering he had a beautiful collie that looked like Lassie.


  Ah, the trusty wardog.  Sick them on a party of orcs and watch the fun....until the DM gets pissed and says there are no more dogs for sale.

   Flasks of oil...ah the good old days!  I loved it when a high level character, carrying a half dozen or so flasks, would fail a save versus fireball or some such.  Human torch.  One character got raised from the dead and took to wearing a mask to hide his hideous disfigurement.  Cool.

   I always discouraged inexperienced (or second rate) players from trying a magic user.  You have to pay extra attention when you have no armor or hit points...and you have to be able to think of a way to contribute when the spells are gone.
  8)
Mark


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Post Posted: Thu Feb 09, 2006 8:31 am 
 

The best thing about being a low level magic user (4th and lower) is that most DMs ignore you. Face it, the threat level is near zero. But when you hit that magic 5th level and get a fireball or lightning bolt, everything changes...as well as getting three magic missiles. All of the sudden damage output is dramatic.

The problem is waiting (surviving) until that time. How many times have you wanted to waste most of the party because they constantly complain about your spell selection.

ex.
"What do you mean you didn't pick detect magic as one of your two first level spells?"

"If you had an unseen servant we wouldn't be in this mess!"

"I can't believe you don't have mending memorized."

"We sure could have used a rope trick spell."

Then inevitably it come down to this...from a fighter who is low on hit points and getting beat.

"You need to throw a magic missile spell at that orc or I am gong to die!"

"I don't have one. You guys made me take Tenser's Floating Disk!"


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Post Posted: Thu Feb 09, 2006 9:01 am 
 

bbarsh wrote:"You need to throw a magic missile spell at that orc or I am gong to die!"

"I don't have one. You guys made me take Tenser's Floating Disk!"

I'd be thinking of how to get that orc underneath the (presumably laden with 100 to 400 pounds of gold) disc at this point...

"Dive and roll!  We won't have attacks of opportunity for two more editions!"  :twisted:

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Post Posted: Thu Feb 09, 2006 10:40 am 
 

3.5 fixes some of these issues by making some minor spells like detect magic 0-level and allowing a magic user to have a number of them.

8)


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