Just to consolidate most of what has been said for building a true Fochlucan Lyrist (Quad Threat), with no feat requirements, plus an idea or two of my own, see below. As always, skill requirements and MAD remain a sticking point, so being in a generous point-buy or roll-your-ability-score environment using fractional BAB and Saves is a real lifesaver.
Bard 4/Hunting Druid 1(UA)/Martial Rogue 2(UA)/Green Whisperer 3(Dr311)/Sublime Chord 2/Fochlucan Lyrist 8
FEATS
Required Feats: None
Recommended Feats: Able Learner
Available Feats (Human without Flaws): 10
Optimum Feats Recommended: Snowflake Wardance, Nymph’s Kiss, Power Attack, Combat Expertise, Improved Initiative, Practiced Caster-Sublime Chord, Combat Reflexes, Dodge, Karmic Strike, Leadership. You can substitute Words of Creation if you are Neutral Good and replace Nymph’s Kiss if you have a generous Int.
SKILLS
Assume Int 14, you have roughly four skills aside from Perform and Profession (astrologer) you can max out (possibly more). Max out UMD, Diplomacy, Spellcraft, and Knowledge (arcane). Others to max out if possible include Hide and Movesilently, or Bluff and Sense Motive, depending on play style and party role.
If you have Flaws, grabbing Obtain Familiar and Improved Familiar (bogun) is nice. Your little Bogun can, just like a homunculus, use your UMD with the Nymph Cheerleader’s (see below) bonus, give you a constant +2 aid bonus to all skill attempts, and be polymorphed into an Effigy creature you can ride around on.
Use Leadership to grab a Vow of Poverty Nymph Marshall 7/Druid 4 cheerleader with Motivate Charisma (for UMD checks and Diplomacy), Motivate Intelligence (for those eventual Epic Spell checks and Bardic Lore), Motivate Dexterity (for Initiative, should be the default motivation), and Determined Caster (overcome spell resistance and easier dispels).
EQ
Recommended Equipment:
Adamantine Maiming(MiniH) Dueling(MiniH) Scimitar of Wrathful Healing(E&A)
Soul Fire(BoED) Tesselated(A&EG) Mithril Fullplate Armor of Heavy Fortification
Star Mantle Cloak(BoED)
Keen Scabbard
Belt of Magnificence +6.
For defense, a Spiked Gauntlet of Spellbalde, Defending, and Warding is nice.
For ranged attacks, a Magebane(CA) Seeking(MoF) Shortbow of Songs(CV) can use ammunition with Radiant Holding(MoF), Lucky(XPH), and Binding(A&EG) is nice.
Anything which increases your stealth is a plus.When a weapon hits you, make a Ref save to avoid all of the damage and then hit them back using Karmic Strike. You may even break their weapon. Do NOT buy +5 inherent bonuses to ability scores if you plan to go epic. Careful use of a thought bottle and/or Epic Spells will give you the same bonuses if you can be patient.
Class Features:
Bardic Music as Bard 16
Bardic Knowledge as Bard 16
Wis to AC (useful for when you are without your armor)
Trapfinding
Evasion
Song of Power
Unbound
Spells Available:
9th level Sublime Chord spells as SbC 10 with casting level 18 (or 20 depending on DM)
3rd level Bard spells as Brd 7 with casting level 18 (or 20 depending on DM)
6th level Druid spells as Drd 12 with casting level 12.
NG druids can make use of spells from BoED. Yet another advantage of being a good FL.
SPELLS RECOMMENDED (lots of thanks owed here to Snow Savant from the sorcerer spells thread)
Underlined spells would be if you can get them from the original Illumian sigil, Hoon.
1st = Know Protections, Incite, Swift Expeditious Retreat, Benign Transposition
2 = Alter Self, Undeniable Gravity, Detect Thoughts, Mirror Image
3 = Clairvoyance/Clairaudiance, Major Image
4 = Evard's Black Tentacles, Dimensional Anchor, Greater Invisibility, & Charm Monster.
5 = Teleport, Telekinesis, Magic Jar, & Ghostform.
6 = Greater Dispel Magic, Prismatic Eye, Disintigrate, Antimagic Field
7 = Reality Maelstrom, Greater Scrying, Simbul's Spell Sequencer.
8 = Mind Blank, & Polymorph Any Object,
Reverse Gravity, Force Cage9 = Shades,
Gate, Shapechange, Time Stop, Reaving DispellALTERNATE ROUTES
Better Damage - Sub a level of Dragonslayer for one level of Greenwhisperer. You lose a level of druid casting for the ability to use all martial weapons and be immune to fear. Best for a FL who wants to wield a two handed weapon, Falchion recommended. Allows for better power attacks using that nice Cha bonus from Wardance and the doubled bonuses from the inspire courage ability. Requires Iron Will and Dodge, so you are losing a feat, probably Karmic Strike.
Better Stealth - Sub two levels of Shadow Dancer in for the two Rogue levels. Get Evasion, Hide in Plain Sight, Uncanny Dodge, and Darkvision. Combined with +x to Hide/Move Silently equipment and spells like Forest Fold, enemy mages will find it hard to target you with spells, and damage dealers will have a hard time figuring out where you are. Requires Dodge, Mobility, and Combat Expertise, so you are losing another feat to take one, Mobility, you would not otherwise take. My recommendation is lose Leadership, if you can get LA buyoff (UA). Then grab Fire-Souled template (Dr ??) to get +4 Cha and Leadership feat for +3 LA. If not, lose Improved Initiative, and grab some equipment to help you out (see the
Optimizing Initiative Thread ).
ALTERNATE RACES:
If you can get your DM to use the +1 LA Illumian race originally posted on the Wiz Web Site (it has since been removed and replaced with the weaker version), go in this order with Sigils: Khur, Bley, Zill, Vaul, Shel, Hoon. This gives +6 rounds of Bardic Music, +3 saves, +6 to overcome SR, +6 HD limit of polymorph spells, and six extra spells known of 9th level or lower. You don't even need LA buyoff.
EPIC:
Either go Epic Fochlucan Lyrist or Eldritch Master (Dr 280) depending on how you like your Epic spells. My own preference would be 5 levels of FL immediately to get extra Epic Spell Slots (double the normal number, 6 slots at level 27), and then at least 4 levels of ElM and grab the Cleric spell list. If you keep going ElM, grab the Ranger spell list, since you get an abundance of lower level buff spells from the ranger (arrow storm and blade storm, wraithstrike, etc.).
EPIC Feats
21st - Epic Spell Casting
24th - Epic Leadership (Bump up your Cheerleader)
27th - Battle Dance (Dr #297, pg 28), Epic Inspiration
EPIC Buffs:
With Epic magic, you can get +5 inherent bonuses to each ability score. You can also give yourself +20 enhancement to at least one ability score for 40 hours, and at least three ability scores by level 27, all for minimal XP, gold, and time, even without a multitude of caster allies and a though bottle.
