# Forum > Gaming > Roleplaying Games > D&D 3e/3.5e/d20 > Optimization Ritual of the Dark Flames + Binder (Naberius)

## redking

> *The Ritual of the Dark Flames*: This ritual was created while Cyric was still insane from reading the Cyrinishad. It allows the recipient to invoke black flames of negative energy from her hands as a supernatural ability. The flames are a ranged touch attack with a range of 10 feet that deals 1d6 points of damage per Hit Die of the user (undead are healed rather than damaged by this effect). Unlike the similar ability possessed by the Spur Lords (see below), this power has a cost: Each time the dark flames are invoked, the user suffers 2 points of temporary Wisdom damage. The ritual requires a black onyx worth at least 100 gp and drains 1,200 XP from the recipient.


This is from Lords of Darkness. It's highly likely that the damage is capped at 15d6 like the Spur Lord PrC, but not limited by a number of times a day because you are paying Wisdom damage.




> *Dark Flames (Su)*: A Spur Lord of 3rd level or higher can invoke black flames of negative energy from his hands. The flames are a ranged touch attack with a range of 10 feet and deal 1d6 points of damage per Hit Die of the user (maximum 15d6). Undead are healed rather than damaged by this effect. A Spur Lord can use this ability a number of times per day equal to 1 + his Charisma modifier.


If you are a binder of Naberius (healing ability damage) you can become a kind of dollar shop warlock firing off "dark flame" blasts all day, up to 15d6.

Is there anything that I have overlooked? I've searched on the internet, and there is nothing in terms of optimising this ability.

This ability also appears in _Cormyr: The Tearing of the Weave_

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## pabelfly

There isn't much in the way of supernatural ability support, unfortunately, unless you want to get Empower Supernatural Ability, which only empowers once per day per feat pickup.

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## icefractal

Not sure how viable it is as a primary tactic, but it's a nice extra for anyone already binding Naberius, and a good healing source for undead.  Hadn't heard of this one before; nice find.

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## Promethean

The ritual does Not have a cap by RAW as is.

It's missing the "functions as [spell or ability]" text instead mentioning there is a similar ability.

This might even be intentional, allowing the ability that has an actual cost to do slightly(20d6 instead of 15d6) more damage is perfectly balanced(for the 3e supplement this is from, because that existed before the easy access ability restoration effects of 3.5)

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## Thunder999

It's not capped, it even mentions that the other ability is only similar, it never says it functions like it.  

Having said that 1d6/HD on a ranged touch with only a 10ft range isn't exactly amazing.  

There's no real way to improve the damage to the point that it's actually good, the range is short enough that you're probably eating an AoO against anything Large or bigger (for the ranged attack) and there's no way to affect multiple creatures at once.

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## pabelfly

If you have a way of gaining a lot of extra hit dice above character level, like with, say, Polymorph, etc, the damage would be much better. What are the highest HD creatures players can turn into?

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## Chronos

There's also very low opportunity cost to taking this ritual, so you could combine it with (for instance) a bunch of levels of rogue.

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## Thunder999

Polymorph is capped at your HD and when you turn into something with a different number of HD your HD doesn't change, so that really wouldn't help.  

I guess there's stuff like Assume Supernatural Ability and turning into a Barghest, but that's some major gamebreaking cheese to use a mediocre damage ability.

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## pabelfly

What about Bard's Inspire Greatness? It increases HD and explicitly works with spells that require hit dice, so there's no reason not to apply it to supernatural abilities. Add Song of the Heart and Words of Creation for an extra 5HD in total and a further boost to the ability.

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## ShurikVch

Power Surge feat (_Dragon_ #313) allow to add +1 damage per die




> the range is short enough that you're probably eating an AoO against anything Large or bigger (for the ranged attack)


"_However, supernatural abilities do not provoke attacks of opportunity_..."?

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## Thunder999

> Power Surge feat (_Dragon_ #313) allow to add +1 damage per die
> 
> 
> "_However, supernatural abilities do not provoke attacks of opportunity_..."?


I literally specified in the brackets, you don't provoke for casting it, but you still provoke for making a ranged attack.

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## icefractal

I don't think that applies.  The listing for ranged attack in that section is:



> Ranged Attacks
> With a ranged *weapon*, you can shoot or throw at any target that is within the weapons maximum range and in line of sight. The maximum range for a thrown weapon is five range increments. For projectile weapons, it is ten range increments. Some ranged weapons have shorter maximum ranges, as specified in their descriptions.


If it applied to all forms of ranged attack, then spells with ranged attack rolls (Ray of Frost, say) should provoke _two_ AoOs.

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## Thurbane

It can be combined with Sneak Attack or other precision damage.

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## Thunder999

Ranged attacks are ranged attacks, or are you arguing that none of the ranged attack rules (such as point blank shot, cover etc.) apply to ranged touch attacks.

And yes, ranged touch spells do provoke twice, or once if you cast defensively.

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## Rebel7284

> The ritual requires a black onyx worth at least 100 gp and drains 1,200 XP from the recipient.


This can add up if you use it a bunch....

Delivering precision damage does seem like a pretty good use for this ability since it's a touch attack with reasonable base damage! (lack of iterative attacks hurt as you level though)

As far as increasing HD, a Bard that specialized in it, can grant up to 9 bonus HD with Inspire Greatness + Song of the Heart + Words of Creation + Focused Performer (Dragon #338).  (although Words of Creation = Exalted and that can cause issues for buffing likely evil PCs)

Otherwise you're stuck with Polymorph into Barghest + Assume Supernatural Ability which works but is SUPER cheesy and it's really hard to get that many corpses of humanoids with more HD than you have....  still, you can go up to 18HD this way

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## Thurbane

> This can add up if you use it a bunch....


I thought it was a one-off cost to get the ability permanently?

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## Rebel7284

> I thought it was a one-off cost to get the ability permanently?


You're right, it's permanent.  Mistake on my part.

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## Rebel7284

Also, in addition to Binder, you could become immune to the Wisdom damage.

- Warforged Juggernaut gives you 24/7 protection 
- Sheltered Vitality is 1 minute/level 
- Shape Soulmeld (Strongheart Vest) should work with this too.
- Sacred Vitality feat works too, but uses precious Turn Undead uses.

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## ShurikVch

> Also, in addition to Binder, you could become immune to the Wisdom damage.
> 
> - Warforged Juggernaut gives you 24/7 protection 
> - Sheltered Vitality is 1 minute/level 
> - Shape Soulmeld (Strongheart Vest) should work with this too.
> - Sacred Vitality feat works too, but uses precious Turn Undead uses.


There is an old argument about "no fuel - no fire": i. e. if you would be incapable to suffer Wis damage - you also would be incapable to produce the Dark Flames
Naberius sidestepping it neatly: because you really suffering that damage - but just recovering it in mere rounds

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## Rebel7284

> There is an old argument about "no fuel - no fire": i. e. if you would be incapable to suffer Wis damage - you also would be incapable to produce the Dark Flames
> Naberius sidestepping it neatly: because you really suffering that damage - but just recovering it in mere rounds


Hellfire warlock explicitly says that you can't be immune to Con damage, this ability doesn't have any such wording.   
It also doesn't say that BY taking wisdom damage, you create the flames.  
It sounds more like an aftershock due to being exposed to divine insanity.

Your mileage may vary of course, but I don't see any mechanical or flavor reasons it shouldn't work.

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