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MrRigger
2010-08-14, 10:27 AM
I've been working up a Half Giant Warblade (ECL 4) build over the past day or two, and I'm wondering if anyone has any suggestions for favorite maneuvers or stances? I'm not looking for complete optimization or anything, I'm probably a bit late for that anyway. I've picked out Bolstering Voice for my Stance, and Moment of Perfect Mind, Sapphire Nightmare Blade, Stone Bones, Leading the Attack, and Mountain Hammer as my Maneuvers. Any suggestions?

For a bit more context, I'm playing in a low magic, low wealth world. We've got an Exalted Druid and a Half Dragon Sorcerer in the party, and the DM claims that those two are the highest concentration of magic in quite a ways. Needless to say, we're not likely to see a lot of magical items or boosting equipment anytime in the near future.

MrRigger

Eldariel
2010-08-14, 10:37 AM
What type of a character do you want? That really determines my preferences. Though for a Psionic race, I really love Diamond Mind (well, I love it anyways). It screws around with action economy, has some really impressive Strikes and comes with some defense too.

Then White Raven and Iron Heart are really good on offense and defense respectively. Tiger Claw has some really nice strikes but best supports a TWFer (though THFer also benefits of some of the strikes quite a bit), and Stone Dragon has few great maneuvers but I don't like it by and large.

ex cathedra
2010-08-14, 10:44 AM
Someone will invariably suggest both Iron Heart Surge and White Raven Tactics, with good reason. Their wording makes both of them rather level-inappropriate, to be honest, and there are few reasons not to take either.

Otherwise, it's very straight-forward. Being a Half-Giant, I trust that you'll pick up a greatsword and do nasty things with it. Iron Heart and Stone Dragon are good for this, the former especially.

Fouredged Sword
2010-08-14, 10:56 AM
Consider punishing stance for an option if you can. It is good to have stances picked out so that you have very difrent combat methods. White raven is best with other melee, and you don't look like you have that. I would suggest takeing a large greatsword and mountain hammering the world into submision. Stone dragon looks like the way to go. Mix it up with dimond mind strikes to have sure hits.

With high strength take power attack and maybe cleave.

Consider (as you are in low magic) progressing to master of nine. Unarmed strikes and a reach weapon give great versitility, as if you load up on desert wind and setting sun you can deal a goodly bit of damage.

You can draw out the master of nine into a 13 level class if you take Legacy Champion. Besides, a legacy weapon is a good magic item for a low magic game, as it fits the theam of magic items being rare and, well, legendary. You have a good shot at talking your DM into letting you have one by tenth level. I would try for unfettered (the stone dragon legacy weapon)

MrRigger
2010-08-14, 11:06 AM
I'm going for someone who can do a lot of damage in a short amount of time. Like I said, it's a low wealth world, so it's pretty likely I won't be able to push my AC up very easily, which means I'll need to kill quickly.

Flavor-wise, I'm having him be a Boisterous Bruiser of the highest order. Fight and Drink, and talk about the fight he just had while drinking. Of course, this means he's not likely to do much sneaking. He's definitely more likely to challenged the guards to a contest than he is to sneak past them. Of course, if that means they're distracted while the party rogue starts doing his sneaking thing, that's just a big coincidence, isn't it?

EDIT: I do have Power Attack and Cleave, and I'm planning on using them to beat the world into submission. I haven't looked at Master of Nine though, I'll have to do that. ToB, I presume?

MrRigger

Fouredged Sword
2010-08-14, 01:11 PM
Yes, it is ToB, and it lets you take ANY of the nine paths with ANY ToB class progression. It takes a lot of feats to enter, but it is powerful if built right. Every odd level you learn 2 more strikes, and even odd you learn 1. You get an extra readied maneuver at EVERY LEVEL! Also the second level ability is a limited version of the warblade capstone, two stances at once.

Now the class is only 5 levels long. :smallfrown: That is 8 maneuvers known and 5 extra readied.

But we can do something about that, now can't we.

Legacy Champion from Weapons of Legacy page 19 is a 10 level PrC that grants 8 levels of progression in another class's features.

Take it after MoN and let it turn MoN into a 13 level long class over 15 levels.

Now you have not 8, but 20 extra known maneuvers, and not 5 but 13 extra readied maneuvers. That will easily grant you all 9 9th level strikes, and cherypick all the best stuff from ALL the nine paths.

Now the end of this turns out to be a low epic build, but you can at least squeze in all of master of nine and at least 7 levels of legacy champion. That will net you 10 levels of master of nine.

MrRigger
2010-08-14, 01:33 PM
I've taken a look at the Master of Nine, and I definitely like it, though I'll have to multiclass to one of the other ToB classes to start it at level 8. And I'll probably have to convince my DM into allowing Legacy Weapons in order to get into Legacy Champion. This is of course assuming our game makes it to that level.

MrRigger

Darrin
2010-08-14, 09:14 PM
I've taken a look at the Master of Nine, and I definitely like it, though I'll have to multiclass to one of the other ToB classes to start it at level 8. And I'll probably have to convince my DM into allowing Legacy Weapons in order to get into Legacy Champion. This is of course assuming our game makes it to that level.


Master of Nine is a bit of a trap. There's a huge feat tax to get into it: five feats for a Swordsage, and six for a Warblade, which might be tolerable if half of them weren't nearly useless. Yes, Master of Nine is a little like getting the keys to the candy shop, you get all those wonderful maneuvers you've been drooling over, but a well-tuned Warblade who didn't blow all his feats on prereqs only needs one or two good maneuvers to hand you your lungs on a platter. If you really need something in a non-Warblade discipline, it's usually much more effective to get it some other way than going through Master of Nine.

Also, don't bother with the legacy weapons. The legacy weapon stuff has horrible mechanics. You can buy or make *MUCH* better weapons that don't require you to sacrifice ability scores and base attack bonus. Legacy Champion is a bit more useful for a few optimized builds, but it's usually not worth losing full BAB or a nice capstone ability (and Warblade 20 has got a really sweet capstone).

Snake-Aes
2010-08-14, 09:20 PM
What weapons do you use the most? 2h?1h+shield?twf? Iron Heart has a good few maneuvers for 2h(iron heart surge, adamantine tornado? it's whirwlind attack twice, with a bonus). You also can't go wrong with diamond mind(avalanche, time stands still, bounding assault and concentration-for-saves). Tiger Claw gets you a few TWF goodies(girallon flesh rip, raging mongoose).
Stone Dragon probably also fits your style. Make sure to pick a couple of the handier ones (ability damage/lockdown, ignore dr, resistance against trip/bullrush/overrun).

MrRigger
2010-08-14, 09:52 PM
I'll be honest with you, this is my first melee character that is actually seeing the light of an actual campaign. I've done melee builds just to build them, but haven't actually played any of them. My very first character was a skill monkey rogue, and then I've played a few casters, and this character is replacing a Monk, who I don't count as a melee build, seeing as how I never actually hit much of anything. But the less said about that, the better, especially given this board's general feelings on monks.

What that's getting to is that I don't really have a favorite weapon type. I'm always partial to having a higher AC, which is pushing me towards a Longsword and shield, but I love looking at the Large Greatsword and seeing the damage I can do with that, even if it means sacrificing some AC. I don't see me working with any kind of TWF, so I think I stay away from a lot of the Tiger Claw maneuvers.

Of course, I'm not sure how far my DM is planning on taking the game, so I want to find that out before I go changing my entire build if I won't reach the level that all my prerequisites are for.

MrRigger

Greenish
2010-08-14, 09:56 PM
I don't see me working with any kind of TWF, so I think I stay away from a lot of the Tiger Claw maneuvers.Look at them. Only a few of them are geared for TWF.

Snake-Aes
2010-08-14, 10:00 PM
Look at them. Only a few of them are geared for TWF.

They involve jumping at enemies raining death from above (one is even called death from above), which is awesome in concept and good in mechanics. I don't know how well that fits his preferred style, though. It sure works if he'll jump a lot.

MrRigger
2010-08-14, 10:09 PM
Oh, I'm not saying I wouldn't take any, quite a few look like definite picks for later on. However, I think I'm going to focus quite a bit on Stone Dragon and Iron Heart, they look like they will be a lot of fun, as well as particularly devastating.

MrRigger

EDIT: I don't think I'll be doing a lot of jumping around. I want to be able to be able to walk up to a guy and beat him into the ground without flailing around like a caffeinated baboon.