Vestiges and Binders

[MrFilthyIke]

Hey,

I'm likely to try playing a Binder in a campaign that is about to start up,
and I need help. What issue of Dragon had the extra Vestiges? Are
there any other sources of Vestiges?

Anyone have any advice on playing a Binder?

 

[kenmarable]

Dragon #341 had Primus (3rd level) and Kas (4th).

Ashardalon (8th level, I think) in Dragon Magic.

Vanus, the Reviled One (6th) in the Designing Your Own Vestige article.

And 3 psionic-related ones here - Arete, the First Elan (4th), The Triad (6th), and Abysm, the Schismed (8th).

I imagine searching around the WotC messageboards would turn up some, but their balance might be questionable (but I'm sure most are just fine). That's what I recall off the top of my head. You should tell Paizo to publish some more in Dragon magazine. I know of at least 1 (and probably more) proposals that include them.

Either way, I would like to see more lower level vestiges since many of the new ones are all higher level.

I am currently playing a swordsage/binder but have been focusing more on the swordsage portion than the binding, so I don't have much experience yet. I'd love to play/NPC a pure binder someday to get a good feel for it. From what I have heard from others, they can be a bit rough to run until you can bind more than one vestige and/or gain the Expel Vestige feat. Before then, you are quite flexible between days, but during any given day, you are typically far more narrowly focused than other classes.

If nothing else, the flavor of the class is really fun. The other characters have learned to put up with my binder's "moodiness" from the various influences.

 

[MrFilthyIke]

...tons of info clipped...

You, good sir, rawk.

 

[Hairy Minotaur]

There's also 1 vestige in Dragon Magic

Binders are really great when you know what you're going to be up against. Cold creatures or trolls? Amon is a must!

Otherwise you either get lucky or you relegate your PC to that of a support character (not that there's anything wrong with that)

 

[kenmarable]

Also, Googling around, I found the Green Lady by James Jacobs. Since he's one of the Paizo top guys, I'd figure it's more reliable than the ones posted on the WotC boards (and there's several, but I haven't had time to sift through them to see which are good and which aren't - there might even be some on the EN World boards as well).

However, on the face of it, it looks pretty powerful to me. He wrote it up for his cleric/binder, so the turn undead ability and such make sense for that PC, but in general, I'd say that's quite the ability, especially at your effective binder level. The ability to use wands and staves as a wizard at first also sounded pretty powerful for a 2nd level vestige, but most PCs will never see a staff for quite a few levels still, and being able to use wands probably isn't as powerful as it first struck me.

So, personally, I'd make the turn undead as 1/2 EBL or EBL-3 (like paladin), but that's just me.

 

[Clueless]

... Ken? Is that you? Wait - you got into the Burning Sky series and didn't *tell* us?!?

 

[kenmarable]

Add two more in the Cityscape web ehancement:
Astaroth, Unjustly Fallen (4th level) and Desharis, the Sprawling Soul (6th level).

Oh, and it is me, Clueless. Sorry, I figured I would definitely blather on about it at Planewalker when it is released in June.

 

[Hussar]

Cool. Thanks for this.

 

[atomn]

Great post, I was about to ask the same exact questions!!

 

[lukelightning]

Astaroth, Unjustly Fallen (4th level)...

Damn that Astaroth is way powerful. Sure, for a Binder it's ok, but my Anima Mage will love it... any item creation feat I need!

Of the vestiges in Tome of Magic, I really like Malphas... turning invisible whenever I need to is great.

There are a lot of cool tricks you can do by combining vestiges. Otiax and Paimon gives you whirlwind attacks with a 10' touch attack, and O's combat reflexes combines perfectly with P's dex bonus.

For getting information, combine Naberius with Dantalion. Use N's skills to use knowledge checks untrained...combined with D's +8 to knowledge skills.

Then there is always the joy of being a halfling or gnome binder and binding Eurnynome. Be a small creature weilding a large 2d6 hammer in one hand!