Gond’s Way: Artificers of the Realms

Outside of Arcane Power I cannot remember the last time artificers saw some decent support. At this point despite my fondness for Neverwinter I would still not say that I am an overall fan, but almost all of the flavor content can serve as a foundation for other campaigns despite all the Realm’s references; for example instead of Gond you could substitute Moradin or Ioun, and the Lantan Scholar background can just be renamed to whatever lost civilization you want. I do like the idea of tying the artificer to a divine organization, if for no other reason than I have been playing Space Marine and it makes me think of techpriests.

There is also seven spells and two feats for the crunch fans:

• Ice Shard Traps (level 1 encounter): You create two invisible traps on the ground that deal cold damage and both cold vulnerability and combat advantage for a turn after an enemy steps on one. The downside is that they only last for a turn, so they would work best for groups that have forced movement (or you could combo it up with thundering armor or unbalancing force). Depending on your DM, you could use these with as part of a surprise attack against patrolling monsters.
• Shadowy Figurine (level 2 daily): You create a sustainable figurine that grants partial concealment and a Stealth bonus to nearby allies. 
• Smokepowder Detonation (level 5): A ranged attack that deals fire damage and ongoing fire damage. As an effect, an ally can make a basic attack (with an attack bonus from your Con or Wis if the initial attack hit).
• Arc Infusion (level 7): Lightning damage, grants an ally a save with a bonus from your Wisdom, and deals more damage plus a daze if the ally’s save actually worked.
• Siphon Fate (level 17): Targets one or two creatures, deals psychic damage and imposes an attack and defense penalty (save ends). As an effect, an ally gains a bonus to attack and defense bonuses based on the number of targets you hit.
• Synchronized Weaponry (level 25): A sustainable effect that allows you and an ally to attack a monster after the other has hit it as an immediate reaction, but both attacks need the weapon keyword.
• Coiled Spring Traps (level 27): Similar to ice shard traps, this gives you three, and they deal force damage, slide and prone, and impose a penalty to AC and Fort based on your Con or Wis for a turn.
• Arcane Trapsmith: Gotta be trained in Thievery, but it lets an artificer use her Intelligence mod to disable traps and open locks. Even better, you gain an Arcana bonus when dealing with traps or hazards.
• Hammer of Gond: You have to worship Gond (but any good DM will handwaive this), and it lets you use a warhammer as an implement (which you can treat as a heavy thrown with a range of 6/12).

Winning Races: Eladrin

Beyond the Spiral Tower is a four-page article that provides a quartet of feats for unorthodox eladrin that want more support for arcane classes that aren’t wizard–specifically artificers and warlocks–since as it stands they have two feats for artificers and jack shit for warlocks (note that I’m only counting heroic feats since that’s what the article mostly provides). I suppose swordmages should have gotten some props since they have all of one so far, but then I like artificers and warlocks more so, fuck it, I’m happy.

The synergy here is great. Artificers can take feats that grant them a bonus on a few class skills (effectively Skill Focus doubled), teleport their conjuration effects or summons, grant a free save with bonus when using healing infusion on the target (including yourself), and at 11th-level Feywild Propulsion gives all summoned creatures a teleport speed. At a glance Arcane Repositioning seems weak since it can only teleport one thing within 5 squares, while Redistribute Minions lets you teleport all your shit no matter where they are, but keep in mine that Arcane Repositioning triggers as a free action and can move your conjuration effects: it’s not limited to only creatures.

For warlocks, you can take Eldritch Blade to get an attack bonus when using longswords with eldritch strike, deal Int-based bonus damage on eldritch blasts (all the time), regain fey step instead of the normal pact boon once per encounter, or render yourself invisible to enemies that take curse damage. Very fucking cool.

As an added bonus, there’s also three new familiars, complete with a feat. Fey Familiar lets you teleport your familiar when you use fey step, so long as they aren’t too far away. The new familiars are fiddling grig, faerie dragonling, and coure attendant.

• The grig lets you master and perform bard rituals, acts as a focus for bard rituals that demand an instrument, and when active can immobilize adjacent enemies that you hit with arcane attacks. I think I found a new familiar for Liz. >_>
• The dragonling grants a Bluff bonus, a one-time penalty to saves against charm and illusions, and has a close blast 3 breath attack that it can use when active. Doesn’t deal any damage, but makes them vulnerable to radiant damage.
• Finally, the coure attendant is a pixie-ish eladrin type thing that grants an Arcana bonus, can grab items for you, and makes enemies count the area around you as difficult terrain. When active it can turn into a ball of light that makes it harder to hit, creates light, and causes enemies that end their turns in the light to grant combat advantage (to you only).

Thok, Half-Orc Artificer

One of the pregen characters for my Eberron adventure-path, I envision Thok as more or less like a Warhammer 40k orc, having a knack for building and manipulating magical gizmos. Just, you know, without the insane bloodlust and stupidity…so maybe not much like one at all…? Mostly I was going for a half-orc out in the backwater region of the Shadow Marches having to make due with what he’s got, and when that fails, he can hit it with his axe.

Now, I did cheat a bit and give him seven extra gps so that he could afford the war axe. A completely legit option is to take Crossbow Caster so that he can use his repeating crossbow as an implement (which I would take anyway), Arcane Fury (when he gets an AoE attack), Furious Concoction (“makin’ it orcy”), and Mark of Finding. Were I to play this character, I would definitely take them all, as it fits the theme.

From an optimization stance, this works better with a dwarf (or really anything that gets an Int and/or Con bonus) and taking static shock syncs better with his high Constitution. I was trying to stick with all Weapon-keyword powers.

Thok, level 1

Half-Orc, Artificer
Background: Tharashk Prospector (+2 to Dungeoneering)

FINAL ABILITY SCORES
Str 12, Con 16, Dex 13, Int 16, Wis 13, Cha 8.

STARTING ABILITY SCORES
Str 10, Con 16, Dex 11, Int 16, Wis 13, Cha 8.

AC: 15 Fort: 14 Reflex: 13 Will: 12
HP: 28 Surges: 9 Surge Value: 7

TRAINED SKILLS
Arcana +8, Perception +6, Heal +6, Dungeoneering +8, Thievery +6

UNTRAINED SKILLS
Acrobatics +1, Bluff -1, Diplomacy -1, Endurance +5, History +3, Insight +1, Intimidate +1, Nature +1, Religion +3, Stealth +1, Streetwise -1, Athletics +1

FEATS
Artificer: Ritual Caster
Level 1: Weapon Proficiency (Waraxe)

POWERS
Artificer at-will 1: Magic Weapon
Artificer at-will 1: Aggravating Force
Healing Infusion: Healing Infusion: Resistive Formula
Artificer encounter 1: Burning Weapons
Artificer daily 1: Flameburst Armor

ITEMS
Ritual Book, Leather Armor, Repeating crossbow, Adventurer’s Kit, Magazine, Crossbow Bolts (20), Waraxe
RITUALS
Brew Potion, Disenchant Magic Item, Enchant Magic Item, Make Whole

Class Acts: Artificer

This Class Acts article ties in racial traits with artificer class features, mostly focusing on the various effects of Healing Infusion: curative admixture, resistive formula, and shielding elixir. For example, Astral Elixer causes shielding infusion to grant resist 5 radiant, and the target can end the effect to gain a variable bonus to a save. On the other hand, Human Innovation lets you recharge an ally’s daily item power when you spend an action point. Any race that’s been in a Player’s Handbook is on the list, even a few that aren’t like the minotaur and shadar-kai, which is good for providing a foundation for players that want to play a “non-standard” artificer. There are a total of 25 feats, all Heroic, so useful to any artificer of any level.

Excerpt: Self-Forged

This week we get a preview paragon path pertaining to artificers. The good news is that this means that between now and date, that if anyone is actually playing a non-houseruled single-classed artificer that there is finally an “official” paragon path to snag at 11th-level.

Self-forged are 4th Edition’s renegade mastermakers, and are artificers that augment in order to crib all the warforged’s racial features. You start out by replacing your arm with a battlefist (mine looks like Hellboy’s arm), and then gradually work your way up the chart: you get a +2 against ongoing damage at 11th-level, and can both attach warforged components and take 10 on death saves at 16th-level.

The battlefist is a mace category weapon that deals 1d8 damage and gets a +3 proficiency bonus. You can use Enchant Item, Disenchant Item, and Transfer Enchantment on it, but cannot destroy it with any ritual (only remove whatever bonuses you gave it). Thats pretty much what I would expect, but I’m glad Wizards added in the non-destruction clause since it’ll make things clearer for people that actually needed that degree of clarity.

As for powers, battlefist smash deals 3[W] and pushes the target equal to your Con modifier and also causes it to grant combat advantage. Not bad for an opener.
Self-repair is a standard-daily that heals you for your bloodied value. Very nice.
Finally, flailing gauntlet is your typical Hellboy-Nazi bad guy attack, where you launch your fist at an opponent. It says that its connected by a chain of force, but I think that a normal run-of-the-mill chain will do just fine, thank you. Its only got a range of 2, but targets Fort, deals 4[W] damage, and knocks the target prone. Oh, and for the rest of the encounter it gains reach 2 as an effect.

All in all I like it. Unlike the renegade mastermaker in 3rd Edition, the battlefist here is useful and the rest of the powers help compliment the entire theme. It gives me an idea for a minotaur artificer-tactical warlord when someone else runs an Eberron campaign…