(3.5) Arcane Hunter

[koeldflare]

Hey Playgrounders, I'm looking for a little help finding some stuff. I'm currently attempting to build a character that uses a combination of Arcane Magic and Favored enemy bonuses to hunt down and kill other arcane casters.

So here is the dilemma, I need help finding either a prestige class that gives some good spell advancement and favored enemy increase, or a way to let my arcane caster levels and ranger levels stack for determining various bonuses.

Any help guys? For books I would say most things published by WOTC, including official postings on their site. The only thing I would get denied would be anything homebrew, or using ToB.

Also, if you have any suggestions for various items, feats or Alternate Class Features, be sure to list them. Just please provide a source reference for future looking up's.

[Eldariel]

An easy way to do this would be to be a Mystic Ranger and use Sword of the Arcane Order-feat. This gets you up to 5th level arcane spells (by level 10, no less) and almost full FE advancement. Of course, you'll miss out on the real good stuff.

Other than that, Ranger 1/Wizard X/Generic Gish PrC X seems like your best bet. There's honestly no Ranger/Wizard hybrid in existence, at least to my knowledge. No good one, at any rate. Getting level 1 of Arcane Hunter is plenty though, and this qualifies you for e.g. Eldritch Knight.

Of course, Swiftblade (http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/prc/20070327) is a pretty "ranger-ry" Gish PrC with 4+Int skills & Spot+Listen in class, but it does nothing with Favored Enemy.


Pick Knowledge Devotion [CC] and fluff it as FE? That's easy to do as a Wizard and KD pretty much matches FE fluff-wise anyways; forego the bonuses against non-arcane opponents if that's what you desire.

Also, Archivist-base [HoH] is something to consider as Dark Knowledge superficially resembles Favored Enemy and by default, applies to most esoteric creature types and can be expanded to cover just about anything magical (not mere spellcasters though, but with full divine + most arcane spells, you have enough tricks for those without the FE bonus).

Honestly, I'm not sure FE is really all that; flavor-wise, you don't really need the class feature itself and mechanically it's just not all that strong.

[Geiger Counter]

Play a Slayer and just replace the psionic advancement with arcane advancement.
http://www.verkroost.com/dnd/psionicSlayer.html

[Sinfire Titan]

You need to go Seul Arcanamach/Nar-Demonbinder (using Arcane Disciple to get the Summon Monster spells for Nar-Demonbinder). With the right feats/spell selection, you would have 8th level spells and be a decent threat to the average caster your DM will throw at you (Disclaimer: Unless he reads TO, in which case no one can kill them).



Alternatively, use a Duskblade (but their spell list is fairly limited for caster-killing).

[unre9istered]

Not that great in terms of class features (in fact it kind of sucks) but the fluff of the Mage-Killer from Magic of Faerun is exactly what you're looking for.

[AdamSmasher]

If I were you, I would do something gish-y, probably with swordsage levels.

Take a level of ranger, get favored enemy (arcanists) then take the Nemesis feat. Now, you have blindsense anyone who knows spells or has spell like abilites if they come within 60 feet of you. After that, no more ranger levels. Like others have said, favored enemy just isn't good. You can keep the fluff without actually having the ability.

Look up one of the regular gish builds. My personal favorite is the swordsage/wizard/JPM one.

Use a Magebane weapon (Or two!) and go to town on them.

Alternatively, you could do what I said above but take the wildshape ranger variant and use that to go in to Master of Many Forms and Warshaper. You won't have arcane abilities like you want, but you will be able to shapeshift in to big scary stuff and wreck lives.

[RagnaroksChosen]

wouldn't picking up favored enemy arcanist then picking up favored power attack and power attack be pritty good.

I would figure out away to get
ranger and Seul Arcanamach.

both are great.



Has any one determined if the mage slayer feats are actualy worth it?