D&D 4E Help with alchemist concept in 4e

[AbdulAlhazred]

To the OP, I have to say that, yes, Artificer looks like a good fit. Layer on the alchemy feat and theme mentioned above and it should be fairly evocative.

The idea of a re-skinned Elemental Sorcerer fits the players stated desired role, but might not fit concept because of the emphasis on CHA instead of INT. It'd be nice to split the difference somehow, but that'd stray out into the realm of extensive house ruling or even a new class - I doubt an Alchemist-Theme Artificer|Sorcerer would shake out as desired.

As far as alchemical items are concerned, the fact their consumables leaves them 'needing' to be underwhelming for balance reasons.

Rather than trying to gussy up the items, you could tie the alchemical items to powers.

Consider starting with the Elemental Sorcerer, but with two major changes: 1) Swap INT for CHA as the primary stat. 2) Use alchemical items in place of Implements: The alchemical would provide an enhancement bonus based on it's level, and add/replace it's keywords when used for an at-will, and also add it's riders when used for elemental escalation. Just a random thought.

Now that's an interesting thought, to leverage on the Implement rules for other 'tools of the trade'. You could also do it another way, make an "Alchemists Toolkit" or "Magical Alembic" or whatever you wanted to call it, which has an enhancement bonus, which is applied to the alchemical items made with it. That would be a VERY minor bit of homebrew really.

 

[Tony Vargas]

You could also do it another way, make an "Alchemists Toolkit" or "Magical Alembic" or whatever you wanted to call it, which has an enhancement bonus, which is applied to the alchemical items made with it. That would be a VERY minor bit of homebrew really.

Philosopher's Stone?


Edit: This thread keeps reminding me of the fun I had playing a Minotaur Artificer in an amusing little short campaign...

 

[Jhaelen]

Your Sorcerer is going to spend a theme and a paragon path to get a single minor action? Or are you using alchemical items which don't use your Sorcerer bonuses instead of Sorcerer attacks?

Uh, no. I'm simply _using_ alchemical items. I commented on the statement I quoted, nothing else. I laready stated in the beginning of the thread, that I consider playing an Artificer is the best fit to play an Alchemist character.

In general, if you are a Sorcerer, the fastest way to gain control effects is to simply kill the things dead.

True. It's why we get by quite well without a full-time controller.

 

[Herobizkit]

Possible thought:

Rogue, uses sling to throw/hurl said Alchemical items - would he be allowed to apply sneak damage to said items?

 

[MwaO]

Possible thought:

Rogue, uses sling to throw/hurl said Alchemical items - would he be allowed to apply sneak damage to said items?

Nope. You're not doing an attack with them, Alchemical items make their own attack.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

Nope. You're not doing an attack with them, Alchemical items make their own attack.

Right, by RAW Alchemical items really cannot be buffed in any of the traditional ways. Due to the structuring of their attacks you have to have buffs that are Alchemy-specific (or ones that affect every attack made in a zone or something). Of course DEBUFFS are another story, if you can find a way to make your target vuln or penalize its defenses, or put some effect on it that causes a rider when the target gets hit, etc, then it can obviously apply to an Alchemical attack, at least in principle. Lasting Frost for instance would work well here, especially if you had the Alchemist Savant PP, meaning you could do an attack that invoked LF and then minor action another attack using an Alchemical item for an extra 5 damage. It just adds a tad bit of sauce. While I don't disagree with you that Alchemist Savant isn't a super PP, if you're going that route, then these are the sorts of tweaks to synergize with it and get a little more oomph from the whole thing.

 

[darkbard]

And all this conversation of the past week has confirmed my earlier statement: refluff! Pick sound mechanics outside of the Alchemy "subsystems" (either Artificer if the party needs a leader, closest in flavor anyway, or Sorcerer if going stiker) and simply rewrite the flavor text as the implementation of alchemical items. This is what 4E does best, after all!

 

[EzekielRaiden]

Philosopher's Stone?

Oh, I like that. I like that a *lot.* Should I ever play a straight-up Wizard in 4e, I might have to steal that.