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Doomboy911
2009-12-10, 08:00 PM
Alright as I've said before I have one warforged barbarian, an artificer (they're a team) a druid who when he can will become a vampire, a feral ranger, changeling paladin and me the bard. I've looked through a couple of the prestige classes horizon walker fitting my concept best (though it seems weak) shadowdancer needs me to take perform in dance (and my bards gay enough as it is). War chanter only makes me more dependent on my team, sublime chord I know very little about, spellsword I wonder if I put a weird spell into my weapon like summon monster.Though the one that makes me seem more independent is virtuoso. So which one should I take if you have any suggestions for others I should look into I'm game and if someone could tell me a bit about cabinet trickster would be nice. I just want to know what I should do to help myself and my party.

PinkysBrain
2009-12-10, 08:27 PM
Cabinet trickster is a nice concept but it's weak sauce, from the poor DCs to the arbitrary HD limits. It's a classical non-casters can't get nice things PrC.

Anything with Sublime Chord is obviously going to work well (accelerated casting progression).

Personally I like the Bard 5/Dirge Singer 5/Seeker of the Song 10 ... nice and simple with all PrCs taken to completion. These PrCs are not going to compete with the full casters, but they are certainly not weak sauce either. The Dirge Singer capstone ability can be really awesome if you optimize for it ... also you will be able to bolster the Vampiric Druid (although I have no idea what he is thinking, vampire is completely unplayable as a "normal" character due to LA ... only as a puppet master abusing spawn does it really work, because of chain spawning it works a little too well in fact).

PinkysBrain
2009-12-10, 09:26 PM
Wait I can take more than one prestige class?
Well generally it depends entirely on the DM ... but even the most cantankerous one should not object to you taking another prestige class after finishing the first one.

As for dipping prestige classes, not all DMs like it.

Doomboy911
2009-12-10, 09:54 PM
Alright than thank you that's settled just going with shadow dancer and virtuoso. Those should be best with my class or virtuoso and horizon walker.

Mongoose87
2009-12-10, 10:03 PM
My friend, if you knew anything about how women think, you'd know there's nothing gay about knowing how to dance.

Doomboy911
2009-12-10, 10:17 PM
I can robot, slow dance and break dance I've got all I can handle with women or should robots take over earth.Sure they'll vaporize me but they'll get a good laugh.

Mongoose87
2009-12-10, 10:18 PM
More on-topic, have you considered the Sublime Chord?

Rasman
2009-12-10, 10:38 PM
Dirge Singer might be my favorite PrC for bards, the cap stone is just too good for words, imo, not to mention it makes the RP and backstory more interesting. Other than that, it REALLY depends on what you want to do with your PC. Do you want to be up in people's faces in the thick of it, or do you want to be an uber buffer? You might want to look at Dervish or Dread Pirate, see if you have the prereqs for those, they can be interesting. I believe Dervish is in Tome of Battle and Dread Pirate in Complete Adventurer or Complete Scoundrel.

Mongoose87
2009-12-10, 10:41 PM
Dervish is definitely not in the ToB - I think it's Complete Warrior.

Rasman
2009-12-10, 10:42 PM
Dervish is definitely not in the ToB - I think it's Complete Warrior.

I tend to get those two confused...MB

Sinon
2009-12-10, 11:19 PM
I don’t know why Shadowdancer. Flavor’s nice, but it doesn’t advance spellcasting or your bard abilities?

I’d second (third?) the recommendation that you look into Sublime Cord: bard and wizard/sorc spell lists and since it has independent spellcasting, you can jump out after level 2 when (IIRC) you get song of arcane power.

Since your party doesn’t have a regular full arcane caster, this seems a good way to go.

For some real sickness, take a couple levels of ur-priest before you get into sublime cord; then go mystic theurge. I don’t have my books in front of me, but I think you can use this to pull of 9th level spells in divine and arcane, which could be helpful since you have no cleric and your druid is go to have a little LA problem when he gets his template.

mabriss lethe
2009-12-10, 11:56 PM
Horizon walker isn't weak. It's one of the stronger core PrCs in the game. It can net you good number of nice abilities. The damage bonuses are just icing really (hard to keep track of, sometimes)The real goodies are the associated powers. Immunity to fatigue, tremorsense, dimension door at will(with a short recharge time), darkvision, elemental resistances.... It has some good things in it, with full BAB.

example: a single level(desert terrain) negates the drawbacks of Snowflake wardance. Great for a combat bard.

But that may not be your thing.

Dirge singer is fun.

If you can convince the druid to take improved energy drain once he converts to undeadhood, picking up anything that lets you spawn an endless supply of summoned critters is good. (as the vampire in the game I run just discovered.)

PinkysBrain
2009-12-11, 05:06 AM
shadow dancer
It's not a bad dip for a melee class, but you aren't melee at the moment ... the class defining ability (when not dipping) is summon shadow, which OMG bad.

and virtuoso. Those should be best with my class or virtuoso and horizon walker.
I'd skip horizon walker.

Virtuoso is okay but I think Dirge Singer is more fun to play, it gives you good musical abilities far faster, the nicest virtuoso abilities are at level 9/10 ... on the other hand virtuoso progresses spellcasting, but if you gimp your spellcasting by taking a whole lot of non spellcasting levels that is meaningless.

If you go the Virtuoso route I'd drop shadow dancer and dip Sublime Chord instead.

PinkysBrain
2009-12-11, 05:08 AM
Horizon walker isn't weak. It's one of the stronger core PrCs in the game. It can net you good number of nice abilities. The damage bonuses are just icing really (hard to keep track of, sometimes)The real goodies are the associated powers. Immunity to fatigue, tremorsense, dimension door at will(with a short recharge time), darkvision, elemental resistances.... It has some good things in it, with full BAB.
The really good stuff is after level 5 ... it's decent if you are building a high level core character and starting play at high level. It's a bit boring to actually get to high level.

DonEsteban
2009-12-11, 05:47 AM
I just want to know what I should do to help myself and my party.
Don't listen to anybody and do what fits your character concept best.

Doomboy911
2009-12-11, 06:06 AM
Well the concept to my character is that he's a wandering writer who is only on his journey to make his stories more realistic since people say his stories have holes in them. So he travels the worl to fight monsters and save maidens to actually learn what he's been writing about for years.So I could take horizon walker to match the wanderer theme but than I could take a second prestige class to boost my abilities more.

Myrmex
2009-12-11, 06:11 AM
Well, if you pick the right feats & spells and item, you only need 8 effective bard levels to help your party with inspire courage.

Here's the break down:
+2 inspire courage from bard
+1 inspire courage with inspirational boost, a 1st level bard spell (SpC)
+1 inspire courage with Song of the Heart, a feat from Eberron
+1 inspire courage with a Badge of Honor, a cheap 3/day trinket from MIC

Use the exalted feat Words of Creation to multiply that by 2, for a +10 to hit and damage whenever you're singing or whatever.

Note that you'll have to be good for Words of Creation.

PinkysBrain
2009-12-11, 06:18 AM
Note that you'll have to be good for Words of Creation.
You have to be exalted and any evil act makes you lose the benefits of the feat until you atone.

PinkysBrain
2009-12-11, 06:23 AM
Don't listen to anybody
Decent advice (it's always more fun to discover things yourself).

and do what fits your character concept best.
But this is incomplete without adding that the vast majority of content does not mechanically match up with it's own concept. D&D ain't playacting, if you can't mechanically walk the walk then all that's left is talking the talk which either makes you look in game foolish or forces metagaming (ie. you hit like a wet rag, but lets pretend you are effective any way).

Almost any concept can be made to work ... but very rarely with the prestige classes which have the concept in their fluff.

taltamir
2009-12-11, 07:10 AM
don't vampire have a level adjustment? Becoming a vampire means sacrificing spell progression...

Doomboy911
2009-12-11, 08:53 AM
Yeah but he's trying to make himself stronger and doesn't care for the magic plus we've got enough magic since the artificer can make a scroll for any spell than I can use it.

Doomboy911
2009-12-11, 01:57 PM
Since I can take more than one I see it like this.
If I want to roll in the magic direction: sublime chord and virtuoaso
If I want to run in the support direction: war chanter and spellsword
Now the one that seems good is to grab: Horizon walker and shadow dancer

PinkysBrain
2009-12-11, 03:26 PM
If I want to roll in the magic direction: sublime chord and virtuoaso
Full caster, can't go wrong with this ...

If I want to run in the support direction: war chanter and spellsword
War Chanter has a pretty nice trick, personally I'd go for Jade Phoenix Mage over the Spellsword though.

Now the one that seems good is to grab: Horizon walker and shadow dancer
Meh ... you don't get a lot out of this. You won't be very good at buffing your party members and you will have a hard time keeping up with the barbarian.

Frankly, your "support" build will hit harder.

Person_Man
2009-12-11, 04:18 PM
Can you let us know your level, feats, and books allowed?

Anywho, strait Bard is actually quite good if you know how to optimize Inspire Courage (http://community.wizards.com/go/thread/view/75882/19869994/Bard_Inspire_Courage_Optimization).

Bard 1/Paladin 4 (or something similar)/Warchanter X with Snowflake Wardance and Doomspeak works well as a versatile melee/debuffer/bufffer build.

Sublime Chord is the PrC of choice if you care about spells.

A Bard/War Weaver (Heroes of Battle) is the ultimate party buffer. Basically you cast spells on yourself (like Cure Wounds, Blink, Haste, etc) and they effect everyone in your party. There are a bunch of little caveats and restrictions, but if you know what you're doing, it's very potent.

Whatever you do, be mindful of your spell progression and your music progression. Few PrC fully progress both, and many PrC (Shadowdancer, Dervish, Horizon Walker, etc) progress neither. If a PrC doesn't progress one or both of your two main class features, then that feature will quickly become useless. So assuming that you can't retrain your Bard levels, I would suggest that you avoid any PrC that does not progress at least one of your main class features. This is especially true for a 5th wheel character in such a large group.

Doomboy911
2009-12-11, 09:24 PM
Hmm let me think. So far I'm level two we started up again I have sheild of faith for some reason bardic knowledge and music and another thing I forgot but book wise everything is game though we're mainly playing eberron.

Doomboy911
2009-12-12, 08:07 PM
Though if I want to become a better bard I could combo dervish and shadowdancer.

Optimystik
2009-12-12, 08:49 PM
Though if I want to become a better bard I could combo dervish and shadowdancer.

Those things make you a better fighter, not a better bard. Didn't you want to be a support class?

Doomboy911
2009-12-12, 08:55 PM
Not neccesarily the bard already supports his team I want to do well in a fight as well be it magic or melee perhaps spellsword and dervish would would work considering I could put magic into my weapons and the dervish spin attack seems like a great combo.

Optimystik
2009-12-12, 09:40 PM
Not neccesarily the bard already supports his team I want to do well in a fight as well be it magic or melee perhaps spellsword and dervish would would work considering I could put magic into my weapons and the dervish spin attack seems like a great combo.

Right, but neither of those classes (shadowdancer, dervish) advance your bardsong or your spellcasting, so your support role will be greatly diminshed.

Spellsword is a trap. 5/10 casting is terrible for any gish (even Bards, who will lose 6th-level spells) and the ACF reduction doesn't help you as much since you'll only be in light armor anyway. Jade Phoenix Mage, Abjurant Champion, Eldritch Knight... all are better in every way.

Doomboy911
2009-12-12, 09:51 PM
Why what do they do? Would it be easier if I said what I was looking for in my concept?

PinkysBrain
2009-12-13, 07:23 AM
Jade Phoenix Mage, combines martial manoeuvres (ToB) with spellcasting.

Abjurant Champion, full BAB full spellcasting PrC with easy prerequisites.

Eldritch Knight, the grand daddy of gish PrCs, full BAB 9/10 spellcasting slightly annoying prerequisites (need proficiency with all martial weapons).

All of these work even better with a sublime chord dip of course (take one level, then use the spellcasting progression PrC to progress sublime chord spellcasting). Some DMs might find that too cheesy though.

Doomboy911
2009-12-13, 03:43 PM
Hmm What's good for spell progression as long as I get better with magic and still get some good feats I think I'm set because if I want to improve fighting I could just take a class as fighter or even better get shadowdancer feats and go rogue so I can sneak attack.If I were to multiclass in rogue and fighter it would seem to make other decisions better. The dervish spin mixed with a sneak attack that I can pull off by turning invisible. Also my artificer plans on making some staff that will boost shadow conjuration casting so shadow spells and a shadow prestige class.

Doomboy911
2009-12-14, 05:32 PM
Ah I appear to have made an error my ranger is not a feral she is in fact a shifter. Does that change anything.