General tips on a sorcerer would be greatly appreciated with regards to pure versus other class synergy. PvM survivability would be of greatest concern, not so interested in soloing. Any help from the character builders here would be greatly appreciated. Thanks

What kind of sorc are you planning on? Spellsword? Pure? We need a bit more other than "general sorc". The tradition has been you build it and we show you where a build can be improved.

My general opinions and ideas:

Best combinations utilize high charisma of sorcerer for other purposes. Mainly AC and saves from divines. That means Paladin or Blackguard. Also Knight Commander is good combo, but it feels as more of a supportive.
Sorcerers are best for being magic supports or spellsword tanks. So if you are not interested in solo play, you can be a tank and rely on your party to kill your enemies. Or you can be support behind your party, that enhances their performance.

Both is desirable, but being a support might not be as action packed as being tank.

Otherwise - we need bit more info

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Zendaer Amattis
Torgon Crimsonshade
Khalid Athanalo
CET time zone

Actually the behind the lines, support Sorcerer sounds more like what I'd be interested in. So by not being a spell sword does that push the build to a pure caster build? 30 Levels of caster? Makes the build a bit easier I suppose.

Eh.. I'd avoid a 30 Sorcerer, if I were you~

Somethings to consider, most people have a "Skill Dump" class tossed into most "Pure" builds.

If you want the most possible Caster levels, you could do something along the lines of 29 Sorcerer, 1 Other

Here's my list of "Others" and their practical applications

1 Ranger: When taken in epic levels, it allows you to take an epic spell focus as a bonus feat, which makes this a popular choice. Useful class skills are discipline, and Medium Armor and Shield proficiency.

1 Bard: Medium Armor and shield proficiency! Incredibly useful skills, Discipline, Concentration, Spellcraft, Tumble and UMD, strong choice for skill whoring~

1 Rogue: Light Armor proficiency, You get tumble and UMD, and some trap skills. Less popular to only take 1, most take 2 because they want Evasion (Which I would recommend)

1 Monk: Tumble and Discipline as skills! And you get Evasion as an added bonus. But the alignment restrictions makes this less popular.

1 Fighter: Bonus feats! Yay Bonus feats! Heavy armor proficiency is neat, especially if you have an Autostill caster or want to DC request 0% ASF Full plate. Nice Discipline dump and armor proficiency.

Conversely, if you feel like giving up a few extra levels, a popular choice is combining two of the above classes!

27 Sorcerer, 2 Rogue, 1 Ranger

Taking the ranger levels for your Discipline dump, armor proficiency, Taking the 2 rogue for your Evasion and tumble dump, And trap skills if you can afford it too!

KC/Sorcerer is difficult to make work because that requires a lot of skills, and Sorcerers don't get that many! But it's still possible!

If you're interested in any of these variants, I'd be happy to draw something up for you!~

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Occasionally seen as [DM] Raua, or playerside as...

DC request 0% ASF Full plate.

What would something like this cost DC wise. It would fit with the character idea which is swirling around in my head but would have to do some planning at creation time.

Okay. So If you'd like to go Fullplate Caster, here's my draft on that:

Fullmetal Alch-REDACTED

Human Base:

Sorcerer 29
Fighter 1 (Taken at ECL 29)

Statistics:
STR: 12 (Buffed to carry Full plate, but it could easily be lowered in favor of more Dex)
DEX: 9 (Full plate, you won't need dex)
CON: 14
INT: 14
WIS: 8
CHA: 17 (Ending 24, All level-ups will go here)

Feats:
1) Extend Spell, Still Spell
3) Spell Focus: (Personal Choice)
6) Spell Penetration
9) Empower Spell
12) Greater Spell Focus: (Personal Choice, again)
15) Greater Spell Penetration
18) (Either; Craft Wand, Scribe Scroll, Brew potion, or Great Fortitude.)
21) Epic Spell Focus: (Personal Choice)
24) Epic Spell: Epic Mage Armor
27) Automatic Still Spell 2
30) Automatic Still Spell 3

Sorcerer Bonus:
23) Epic Spell: Mummy Dust or Dragon Knight
26) Automatic Still Spell 1
29) Epic Spell Penetration

Fighter Bonus:
1) Armor Skin

Skills:

33 Concentration
32 Discipline
33 Spellcraft
15 Tumble
+37 Extra (Since there's bound to be skills you might like to throw in, And I'm a sucker for Skilllllllllls >.>)

Auto still 3 Would allow you to cast Spells without ASF worry in full armor! Lucky you, that means you don't have to run around for special full plate.

Like always, that's my build guideline, Other build Gurus can comment on it and give you recommendations based off of this, if you want to go down this path.

You PM'd me about the 27 Sorc/ 2 Rogue/ 1 Ranger, and I'll post it here for others to comment on it as well!

But this is how I usually would build for it!

Cookie-cutter Sorcerer

Human Base:

Sorcerer 27
Rogue 2 (Taken at ECL 26 & 28)
Ranger 1 (Taken at ECL 29)

STR: 10
DEX: 14 (More Dex, since you won't have access to full plate)
CON: 14
INT: 14
WIS: 8
CHA: 16 (Ending 24, All level-ups + 1 Great Charisma feat)

Feats:
1) Extend Spell, Spell Focus: (Personal Choice)
3) Spell Penetration
6) Empower Spell
9) Greater Spell Focus: (Personal Choice)
12) Greater Spell Penetration
15) Toughness (Or a craft Feat)
18) Great Fortitude (Or another craft feat)
21) Epic Spell Penetration
24) Epic Spell: Epic Mage Armor
27) Great Charisma 1
30) Epic Spell: Hellball

Sorcerer Bonus Feats:
23) Epic Spell: Greater Ruin
26) Epic Spell: Mummy Dust or Dragon Knight

Ranger Bonus Feat:
1) Epic Spell Focus: (Personal Choice)

Skills:
33 Concentration
32 Discipline
33 Spellcraft
32 Spot
30 Tumble
18 UMD

Again, My personal take, Other Build gurus are welcome to add their personal alterations and recommendations!

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Occasionally seen as [DM] Raua, or playerside as...

The only thing I would change from the above builds is to take out the spell pen line and replace it with craft wand/brew potion and another epic spell. With 29 spell levels the only thing you have to worry about is drow and monks with feats dedicated to spell resistance.

Would moving from sorcerer to wizard accomplish that with regards to picking up brew potion\create wand and still keep the spell penetration spells?

Mord's and the Spell Breach line also help with spell resistance. Also, Maximise Spell is extremely important and Silent Spell is very handy, too.

As for making a wizard instead, that brings with it a whole host of new RP and mechanical considerations since they work completely differently. What or who do you envisage your character as?

My character concept is somewhat fluid at the moment, it seems to change with each suggestion. I have not played wizard\sorcerer here before. adding brewing\wands is something that would be interesting. the possibility of ASF full plate is interesting. although I do not know how much something like that would cost in DC is interesting, just in the option gathering phase.

Are there many specialist wizards here or is the generalist wizard the norm?

Generalist wizard is recommended if you've never done a near pure caster before. Going wizard over sorc would give you a few more feats if you really want to work the spell pen line in.

I would personally go with combo 23 Sorc / 2 Rogue / 5 KC. You would do great supporting, stood outside of combat in invisibility/hide. Rogue gives you utility skills (traps, locks - if you have INT, but I personally dont go under 14 in most of my builds), KC adds to your support role. With lot of buffs, some good summons (BBoD, epic summons) and maybe few offensive spells you will be invaluable to any party (immunities, stats, holding mass haste from rest to rest etc.).

I am kinda lazy to write complete build here (kinda my habbit of not thinking about build too much, unless it is surely going to be played by someone) but I would go like this:

18 sorcerers, 1 rogue and 1 KC pre-epic (in this order).
After that lvl of sorcerer on 21, 23 and 24, 27, 30 (at least 4 epic spells if I count right). Second rogue level at 29.

Stats depending on playstyle but generally something around 10 12 12 10 14 16 (not precise, just a guess, maybe more dex for utilizing rogue skills, or more strenght.. dunno).

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Zendaer Amattis
Torgon Crimsonshade
Khalid Athanalo
CET time zone

Wizard 24 / KC 5 / Bard 1 Is lovely to play with.

But then again, I'm biased for that one~

(I can toss up what I made for it, if you like, too
EDIT: I have a spellsword Variant and Caster Variant of it, poke me with which one you'd like to see!)

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Occasionally seen as [DM] Raua, or playerside as...

Generally Sorcerer 27/Rogue 2/Ranger 1 is a good way to go. Epic ranger can give you an extra epic spell focus and rogue is funky with evasion and skills. 27 levels grants you the best Gate summons, if you're into that. You can even toss points into animal empathy and grab wildlife to serve you. Charming as heck.

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