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Volomon
2010-07-12, 11:08 AM
Ok, from what I understand in the long term of the game fighters begin to lose their value to such classes as Clerics, Wizard, or Druid. Now does this mean that I can fulfill the fighter role through these classes, Druid with wild shape, Cleric with his high AC plus buffs, a Wizard with summoning minions and overwhelming magic ability.

So is this true? Also is it assuming that fighters are being compared unbuffed by party members?

Ultimately I'm trying to figure out if I can play a Wizard while attempting to fill the role of a warrior by whatever other means necessary say for instance summoning a creature to absorb damage for me. However I also have a current Spike Chain fighter which I would love to see how it works out.

The Spike Chain Fighter (3rd level):
Feats:
Weapon Finesse
Combat Reflexes
Improved Trip
Combat Expertise
EWP: Spiked Chain

At end game I just want my character to be competitive with these classes, however I also don't want to surrender the early game as it seems Wizards end up doing, I had to run around like a little girl in my 1st level adventure (of course I had too) when we bite off more than we could chew, though I bashed a skull here and their with my staff. I chalk this up to poor stats and preparation though and relative small size of the group (3).

So I ask you for my enjoyment and I enjoy mopping the floor with lots of mobs, what would you build between a fighter or a wizard or combination there of if you had only the Core books PHB, DMG, and only the COMPLETE classes books for instance complete warrior, complete mage.

Ultimately I want you to Min/Max a Figher or Wizard or Hybrid, that you feel will show amateur players what true power is using only: Core books PHB, DMG, and only the COMPLETE classes books for instance complete warrior, complete mage. Strictly within these book guidelines

Keld Denar
2010-07-12, 11:17 AM
Have you considered some form of Gish character? One of the biggest underfallings of any melee is the reliance on a friendly spellcaster to do X, because his class doesn't come with the proper tools needed to do X. Being a gish, you have access to a smaller amount of less powerful spells that you personally use to do things like "fly" or "teleport short distances" or "make yourself immune to mind affecting spells" or such.

Check out the Suel Arcanamach handbook. SA is a gish-lite PrC. It doesn't pick up WORLDSHATTERING ARCANE POWAH, but with a little careful planning, you can select spells that shore up nearly all of your own personal weaknesses. The greatest thing aobut SA is that for your first 6 levels, you are a straight, full BAB character, doing what full BAB characters do best. Then, at mid levels, when that starts sagging under the weight of increasingly difficult encounters, you get some magical abilities to augement your martialness and allow you to continue kicking beholders and taking names.

Does this sound appealing?

EDIT: Fighter4/Duskblade2 would be a decent lead-in for Suel Arcanamach, BTW.

Person_Man
2010-07-12, 11:18 AM
My stock Fighter advice, from my melee combo guide (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=127026):

Fighter is actually a respectable choice up to ECL 12ish if you know what you're doing. The keys are alternate class features (forums.gleemax.com/wotc_archive/index.php/t-906113.html) and careful feat selection (see combos above).

At level 1, Fighters get the Tower Shield for free. This in itself is useful. Races of Stone also lets you trade it away for Exotic Shield Proficiency, which has several uses (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?p=6848292). I suggest using it for a Gnome Battle Cloak, which is essentially a shield you wear on your back, which is essentially a free Animated shield. Or you can take the Extreme Shield if you want +3 AC without a To-Hit penalty (but don't care about making shield bash attacks). If you want a mounted build (which is one of your best core-ish options) then I suggest a Riding Shield.

At levels 2 and 6, Dungonscape lets you trade away feats for the Dungeoncrasher ability, which gives you massive damage when you Bull Rush an enemy into a wall or solid object. As others have opined, the easiest way to abuse this is through the Knockback feat. Check out Flaming Homer (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showpost.php?p=4108954&postcount=22) and the King of Pong (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=107248). If you want to be less abusive and/or don't want to be a Goliath, then I suggest you be a Raptorian or Dragonborn (http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/iw/20060105b&page=1) for free flight (though it doesn't kick in until ECL 12). This lets you move above enemies, so that you can Bull Rush them into the floor. You can also get free Bull Rush attempts from the Shield of the Severed Hand (Complete Divine pg 102 or MIC) and/or Brutal Surge weapons (MIC). It's also worth mentioning that Dungeoncrasher damage is so high that even a single mundane Bull Rush per turn can kill most enemies.

At 2nd level or higher you can give up a Fighter bonus feat to gain the Resolute ability (Complete Champion). It allows you to immediately shift 1/2 your BAB to your Will Save. Hugely useful at mid to high levels, as Will Saves are often Save or Lose. Once you get to level 10 or higher I would definitely pick this one up, unless you can find some other form of mental protection.

A nifty web ad on (http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/we/20060327a) gives you various buffs to your ability to Demoralize. The most important kicks in at 11th level, which lets you Demoralize as a Swift Action. This can be a powerful tool (http://boards-test-dev.wizards.com/wotc_archive/index.php/t-911167), especially when combined with the Imperious Command feat (Drow of the Underdark) which makes Demoralized enemies Cower (www.dandwiki.com/wiki/SRD:Cowering).

Put that together, and you get respectable defense, strong offense, and two forms of battlefield control (Bull Rush and Fear). Pretty solid for any low to mid level melee build.

Frog Dragon
2010-07-12, 11:18 AM
1. You don't need to be a caster to be competent. Casters just have much more broken. If it isn't a super high optimization group you can contribute perfectly well with a fighter.
2. I recommend taking out that third level of fighter and replacing it with a Lion Totem Barbarian. Pounce isn't essential to this build, but it's still good. Also, the barbarian level is strictly better than an odd level in fighter.
3. Bad finesse. Bad! Just because you can finesse a weapon doesn't mean you should and it's robbing you of damage if you dump strength. Changes are you won't need to make too many AOO:s a round and even as a tripper, you need damage. Drop finesse, get better str. Replace with Hold the Line from Complete Warrior. It allows you to make an AOO against a charging foe, which you can trip with.
4. Get more reach. Your killzone is 25ft now, but more is always welcome. If you can draw from the SRD, a two level dip of Psychic Warrior allows you to nab Expansion and bonus feats. If not, enlarge person all the way.
Edit: Dual swordsage'd.

Volomon
2010-07-12, 11:37 AM
I appreciate the comments, but I think you guys might be over stepping: Core books PHB, DMG, and only the COMPLETE classes books for instance complete warrior, complete mage.

I also want to point out I love the wizard possibilities (crafting items, awesome power) just as much as I love the possible chain of chain spiked trip attacks and plain doing massive damage or maybe some other massive damage role, Barbarian?

Keld Denar
2010-07-12, 11:46 AM
Well, Suel Arcanamach is in Complete Arcane, Abjurant Champion, the PrC most commonly paired with Suel Arcanamach is in Complete Mage. Spellsword, another class commonly blended into the mix is in Complete Warrior, and Sacred Exorcist, another favorite, is in Complete Divine. Most of the supporting feats that go with the build are in Complete Arcane, Complete Warrior, Complete Mage, and Complete Champion.

The only thing I mentioned that isn't in a source you have access to is Duskblade, which is in the PHBII. That can be replaced by something like Hexblade (CWarrior) to get the required skills needed to get into Suel Arcanamach.

Is this something you might be interested in?

A perfect leadin for SA for you might instead be Barb1/Fighter2/Hexblade3. If you are Human, Dwarf, or Half Orc, you won't have a multiclass penalty for this, although if you do go dwarf, I'd suggest Gold Dorf to stay away from Cha penalties. Same as PHB dorf, just with -2 Dex instead of -2 Cha.

Alternatively, the standard Sorcadin build is legal with your sources.
Paladin2/Sorcerer4/Spellsword1/AbjChamp5/SacEx8 is a classic.

Volomon
2010-07-12, 11:49 AM
Well, Suel Arcanamach is in Complete Arcane, Abjurant Champion, the PrC most commonly paired with Suel Arcanamach is in Complete Mage. Spellsword, another class commonly blended into the mix is in Complete Warrior, and Sacred Exorcist, another favorite, is in Complete Divine. Most of the supporting feats that go with the build are in Complete Arcane, Complete Warrior, Complete Mage, and Complete Champion.

The only thing I mentioned that isn't in a source you have access to is Duskblade, which is in the PHBII. That can be replaced by something like Hexblade (CWarrior) to get the required skills needed to get into Suel Arcanamach.

Is this something you might be interested in?

A perfect leadin for SA for you might instead be Barb1/Fighter2/Hexblade3. If you are Human, Dwarf, or Half Orc, you won't have a multiclass penalty for this, although if you do go dwarf, I'd suggest Gold Dorf to stay away from Cha penalties. Same as PHB dorf, just with -2 Dex instead of -2 Cha.

Alternatively, the standard Sorcadin build is legal with your sources.
Paladin2/Sorcerer4/Spellsword1/AbjChamp5/SacEx8 is a classic.

Sounds interesting for sure, I'll have to look into my books and see how this works out.

Keld Denar
2010-07-12, 12:01 PM
Suel Arcanamach Handbook (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=159617)

Again, given what you are interested in, I'd focus your stats: Str > Cha > Con > Int > Dex > Wis.

For your Suel leadin, assuming Human:

{table=header]ECL|Class|Feats
1|Spirit Lion Totem Barbarian1|Power Attack, EWP: Spiked Chain
2|Fighter1|Iron Will (prereq)
3|Fighter2|Combat Casting (prereq), Combat Reflexes
4|Hexblade1|
5|Hexblade2|
6|Hexblade3|Improved Bullrush
7|Suel Arcanamach1|
8|AbjChamp1|
9|AbjChamp2|Shocktrooper
10|AbjChamp3|
11|AbjChamp4|
12|AbjChamp5|Minor Shapeshift
13|Spellsword1|
14|Suel Arcanamach2|
15|Suel Arcanamach3|Leap Attack
16|Suel Arcanamach4|
17|X|
18|X|feat
19|X|
20|X|
[/table]

Shocktrooper is in CWarrior, Minor Shapeshift is in CMage, and Leap Attack is in CAdv. All the other feats are core.

Combat goes: use long standing buffs to give yourself an advantage. Open combat with swift cast Shield + Enlarge Person. Charge foes for big damage, sacrificing your AC to Shocktrooper. Use Minor Shapeshift and/or Displacement and/or Greater Mirror Image to negate most counter attacks.

Simple, effective, and uses the books you are alloted.

X can be anything. More Spellsword would be ok, and actually Dragon Disciple is pretty slick in this case, as it progresses casting past the normal Suel Arcanamach limit of 10/10.

Volomon
2010-07-12, 12:15 PM
Sounds awesome, hate to be a pain but where is Spirit Lion Totem Barbarian?

Keld Denar
2010-07-12, 12:16 PM
Complete Champion, in the Alt Class Features section. Trades out Fast Movement for Pounce. A VERY good trade.

Volomon
2010-07-12, 12:45 PM
Thanks a lot appreciate the help, going to be my new character.

Mongoose87
2010-07-12, 12:53 PM
Might as well throw some Abjurant Champion in, instead of more Suel levels.

Volomon
2010-07-12, 12:58 PM
Might as well throw some Abjurant Champion in, instead of more Suel levels.

Like where he has the Xs? I looked at the Dragon Disciple and the ability to add in bonus spells to where you want looks nice. Not to sure about Abjurant Champion, but I haven't gotten to look at it yet either.

Keld Denar
2010-07-12, 01:41 PM
Might as well throw some Abjurant Champion in, instead of more Suel levels.

There are already 5 levels of AbjChamp in there from levels 8-12. Since its only a 5 level PrC, you can't add more than 5. I guess you could put in some Uncanny Trickster or whatever, that would progress your Abjurant Armor ability, but 4 levels of Dragon Disciple would gives you Str and Cha increases and 2 extra 5th level spell slots which is actually well worth the loss of a single BAB at this point.

Oh, and natural attacks, because you can never have too many natural attacks...ever.

theos911
2010-07-12, 02:03 PM
Have you considered some form of Gish character? One of the biggest underfallings of any melee is the reliance on a friendly spellcaster to do X, because his class doesn't come with the proper tools needed to do X. Being a gish, you have access to a smaller amount of less powerful spells that you personally use to do things like "fly" or "teleport short distances" or "make yourself immune to mind affecting spells" or such.


These words...
They sound like I just heard them this morning....:smallwink:

Obviously lacking the massive punch the other builds have; is the ever popular Bard/Sublime Chord. Good Casting, BaB could be better, but you get nice skills and other stuff. Probably not what your looking for, but worth a mention, and unlike several common gish-builds is viable from level 1 up.

Volomon
2010-07-12, 06:54 PM
Back again...I don't suppose anyone can explain to me the benefits of Improved Bullrush?

theos911
2010-07-12, 07:05 PM
Back again...I don't suppose anyone can explain to me the benefits of Improved Bullrush?



Improved Bull Rush [General]
Prerequisites:
Str 13, Power Attack.

Benefit:
When you perform a bull rush you do not provoke an attack of opportunity from the defender. You also gain a +4 bonus on the opposed Strength check you make to push back the defender.

Special:
A fighter may select Improved Bull Rush as one of his fighter bonus feats.

Basically, you no longer provoke attacks of opportunity when doing it, and get a nice little bonus to push 'em back more.

dextercorvia
2010-07-12, 07:28 PM
Back again...I don't suppose anyone can explain to me the benefits of Improved Bullrush?

Also, it is necessary for The awesomeness that is Shock Trooper.

theos911
2010-07-12, 07:30 PM
Also, it is necessary for The awesomeness that is Shock Trooper.

Fix'd it for you

dextercorvia
2010-07-12, 07:33 PM
Fix'd it for you

I agree. It is much better now.

theos911
2010-07-12, 07:42 PM
I agree. It is much better now.

See what a little teamwork can do:smallbiggrin: