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unre9istered
2010-06-21, 02:08 PM
I'm doing some TO regarding War Hulk. Having seen a discussion on how useless it is for uber-charging, I'm thinking about taking it in the other direction melee can use effectively (sans ToB): Tripping.

Is there any reason why a War Hulk with a spiked chain wouldn't work obscenely well as a tripper? Use Psi-warrior as the base class to get Expansion and Half-Ogre as the race (unless half-giant's Powerful Build meets the Large requirement of War Hulk). Adding a dip in Barbarian for Rage (or even better Frenzy from Cityscape) helps too.

Currently my thoughts are:

1: Psiwarrior (Feats: Power Attack, Cleave)
2: Wolf Totem Barbarian
3: Wolf Totem Barbarian (Feats: Combat Reflexes, Improved Trip)
4: Psiwarrior
5: Psiwarrior
6: Psiwarrior Large and In Charge

7-16: War Hulk (Feats: Extra Rage?, ?, ?)

Practiced Manifestor may not exist, it's the psionic version of Practiced Spellcaster. I put that there to get access to the +2 sizes augment of expansion. Can't take Practiced Manifestor due to a Knowledge: Psionics requirement. Not sure if extra rage is needed but seemed useful. This build needs a Wis of 11 (min for 1st level manifesting) to work at this point. Int and Cha are both dump stats, but all of the physicals are important. Not sure if Dex>Con or Con>Dex but Str>either. If I go half-ogre then I definitely need at least 16 dex to make use of combat reflexes as the race gets a -2 dex.

Comments? Suggestions? I doubt I'll ever get to play this but it might be fun.

Edit: Get a Skillful spiked chain to save a feat and get a 3/4 BAB while leveling in War Hulk.

Draz74
2010-06-21, 03:06 PM
Practiced Manifester does exist. It's in Complete Psionic.

Doesn't War Hulk have some sort of "stupid and angry" clause that means you would never be able to use any of your psionic powers again after taking one level of it, though?

Eldariel
2010-06-21, 03:10 PM
War Hulk Tripper is good at Tripping but pretty bad at doing a lot with it 'cause you lack iteratives. Again. Get Skillful weapon or some source of Divine Power or whatever and it might work. Really, the best use of the class is Hulking Hurler though. Centaur Hulking Hurler/War Hulk is pretty amazing right out of the box with no template stacking or such; quadroped Large base carrying capacity and nice Str bonuses.

The Cat Goddess
2010-06-21, 03:11 PM
Practiced Manifester does exist. It's in Complete Psionic.

Doesn't War Hulk have some sort of "stupid and angry" clause that means you would never be able to use any of your psionic powers again after taking one level of it, though?

No. Just that you lose any ranks in any Int, Wis or Cha based skill except Intimidate and can't put ranks in any of those skills.

I'm not sure about the ruling on the Concentrate skill... it seems to go against the flavor/fluff of the class to be able to use it.

unre9istered
2010-06-21, 03:22 PM
War Hulk Tripper is good at Tripping but pretty bad at doing a lot with it 'cause you lack iteratives. Again. Get Skillful weapon or some source of Divine Power or whatever and it might work.

Forgot about that. Skillful seems to remedy that nicely though.

In fact if I go with guisarme and spiked armor until I get the skillful weapon, I save a feat too.

herrhauptmann
2010-06-21, 05:24 PM
Centaur Hulking Hurler/War Hulk is pretty amazing right out of the box with no template stacking or such; quadroped Large base carrying capacity and nice Str bonuses.

Half minotaur might be better. No racial hit dice, and after applying the stat changes, it says if size is changed, adjust stats appropriately. So I think your dex would drop, but your strength would go up again. Trying to find the primordial template, which is supposed to awesome too...

Dusk Eclipse
2010-06-21, 05:30 PM
Half minotaur might be better. No racial hit dice, and after applying the stat changes, it says if size is changed, adjust stats appropriately. So I think your dex would drop, but your strength would go up again. Trying to find the primordial template, which is supposed to awesome too...

I think you are thinking on the primordia giant template from an eberron book, which yes is awesome for giants (IIRC it gives some nice mental boost and maybe a SLA) so I don't think this particular template will be worthwhile to this particular build. OTHO there might be a primordial template which I don't know about.

Eldariel
2010-06-21, 05:36 PM
Half minotaur might be better. No racial hit dice, and after applying the stat changes, it says if size is changed, adjust stats appropriately. So I think your dex would drop, but your strength would go up again. Trying to find the primordial template, which is supposed to awesome too...

Centaur's advantage is quadroped carrying capacity. But yeah, Templates are better than races, as a rule. No pesky HD.

The Cat Goddess
2010-06-21, 06:03 PM
Half minotaur might be better. No racial hit dice, and after applying the stat changes, it says if size is changed, adjust stats appropriately. So I think your dex would drop, but your strength would go up again. Trying to find the primordial template, which is supposed to awesome too...

Primordial reduces Str significantly, raises Int (and Wis or Cha, can't recall this moment), gives a minor SLA (Invisibility Purge is a good one) and makes Warlock your Preferred Class.

megabyter5
2010-06-21, 09:50 PM
Doesn't War Hulk have some sort of "stupid and angry" clause that means you would never be able to use any of your psionic powers again after taking one level of it, though?

I found the PrC in an online article someone linked to, and the table mentioned a class feature called "No Time To Think", but it wasn't in the text anywhere... Is that what that is?

unre9istered
2010-06-21, 10:01 PM
As someone said earlier, No Time To Think makes any ranks you have in a Int, Wis, or Cha based skill (other than Intimidate) drop to nothing and you can't spend any more skill points on those skills.

Eldariel
2010-06-21, 10:09 PM
This is the link (http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/iw/20030914a). And yeah, No Time To Think isn't spelled out for whatever reason. Ah well.

Biffoniacus_Furiou
2010-06-22, 01:52 AM
No Time To Think causes you to be treated as having 0 ranks in every Int- Wis- and Cha- based skill except for Intimidate, regardless of how many skill points you spend in them. Kn: Psionics is required for Practiced Manifester, and upon taking War Hulk you permanently have 0 ranks in that so you can never use Practiced Manifester with a War Hulk.

War Hulk's biggest drawback is that it's incapable of taking Defensive Sweep from PH2, due to the build's lack of BAB.

You can use the Wolf Totem barbarian variant and take two levels of that to get Improved Trip without having to take Combat Expertise. Also be sure to get Knock-Down (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/divine/divineAbilitiesFeats.htm#knockDown). You should also include Knockback (http://www.realmshelps.org/cgi-bin/feats.pl?Knockback), so every hit knocks them prone and knocks them away, so they'd have to spend a move action to get up and another move action to get back into melee and every attack you make would waste an opponent's next turn. Two or six levels of Fighter for Dungeoncrasher also works well with that. Getting the Brutal Surge property on your weapon is a decent substitute for that. Large and In Charge from the Draconomicon is also a good feat for a large tripper. Take Aberration Blood and Inhuman Reach from LoM, which gives a large character a 15 ft. natural reach, which would be extended to 30 ft. with a reach weapon. If using a medium size powerful build race, also get Willing Deformity and Deformity: Tall in HoH to get the same reach, though the feat doesn't function if you're not currently medium size.

veovius
2010-06-22, 07:55 AM
Now if you could only get War Hulk/Hulking Hurler into a Bloodstorm Blade/Master Thrower build...I trip with Worlds. At range.

ShneekeyTheLost
2010-06-22, 08:02 AM
You will definately need some method of getting more BAB, either through Skillful or through Divine Power. Skillful gives you a flat 3/4 BAB equivalent, if your BAB is lower, and should suffice for most things

veovius
2010-06-22, 08:09 AM
With Gestalt though, just imagine the shenanigans ....... :D The factotum/Master thrower/Bloodstorm blade already is bad enough, but with Warhulk/Hulking Hurler on the other side?

Wait, I just read Hulking Hurler. It doesn't really do anything except let you throw big ....stuff. Cool! Drunken Master for anything as a weapon, Master thrower/bloodstorm blade for throwing/tripping shenanigans, and Warhulk for throwing really really big things :)

unre9istered
2010-06-22, 09:27 AM
I'd love to gestalt this but I really doubt I'll get to play it if I try to include Hulking Hurler in the build, most DM's know better. Gestalting with Warblade and going for Bloodstorm Blade and Master Throwing for ranged tripping would be pretty sweet though.

I've updated the OP to include some suggestions and such.

Runestar
2010-06-22, 09:38 AM
Half ogre cleric7/warhulk10 with DMM: persistant divine power. :smallbiggrin:

unre9istered
2010-06-22, 09:40 AM
For the tripper build I'm pretty sure the size increase from expansion is a bigger deal than the BAB. I can still get most of that from a skillful weapon and the idea is to take advantages of the extra attacks of opportunity to trip and get a free attack.

Eldariel
2010-06-22, 09:46 AM
Wait, I just read Hulking Hurler. It doesn't really do anything except let you throw big ....stuff. Cool!

Do you know how much damage a 600000lb rock does?

The Cat Goddess
2010-06-22, 10:50 AM
The most fun thing is Large + Bloodstorm Blade + Fling Enemy.

You get to throw your opponents at each other... and they come back to you! :smallbiggrin:

veovius
2010-06-22, 02:09 PM
Do you know how much damage a 600000lb rock does?

But you only get to do it once a round! I suppose if you had enough feats to climb the shock trooper tree, it might get even funnier, it's not like there's going to be anything left when you're done :p

AustontheGreat1
2010-06-22, 02:21 PM
Wis and Cha are both dump stats,

You realize that Psychic Warriors use wisdom as their primary manifesting ability?

unre9istered
2010-06-22, 02:23 PM
You realize that Psychic Warriors use wisdom as their primary casting ability?

Nope assumed it was Int for some reason. I'll fix that in the OP.