Thought Experiment: Build the Light Warriors

[Talbot]

Ok, so I've been a way awhile, but I'm considering playing (or at least building) again, and to tune up, I thought I'd give myself a little challenge. I love 8 Bit Theater unconditionally. The challenge is to build the four main Light Warriors as close to their actual abilities in-comic as possible. I'd like to see what the Playground can come up with, and I'll be back with my best efforts later. To start everyone off who's interested, here's a basic idea of what each guy can do, and my initial thoughts on potentially viable avenues. Races and Alignments are pretty much set in stone, but other than that go nuts:



Fighter-

Lawful Good (or possibly Stupid Good) Human

Important Abilities: Dual-wielding. Must be able to take a ridiculous amount of damage. In-comic, eventually gains the ability to "block anything", so a mechanical ability that fits that would help. Bonus points for finding something that looks like Sword-Chucks. Being immune to drowning and/or mind affecting abilities helps for style points. Does not have magic.

Initial Thoughts: Warblade's probably a good chassis for this, but I'm at a loss beyond that.

Black Mage-

Chaotic Evil Human

Important Abilities: General evil magicks, some kind of proficiency with knives (possibly sneak attack; he needs to be legitimately effective with them), and a once-per-day horribly powerful beam attack (the Hadoken). Technically, he also had the ability to learn any attack he survived, but I don't think D&D really has a mechanic for that.

Initial Thoughts: A Sorcerer base is probably the way to go here. No idea how to simulate the Hadoken, but then I basically never play casters.

Thief

Lawful Evil Elf

Important Abilities: Stealing stuff, throwing stuff, countering stuff, kicking stuff. And bluff/diplomacy/forgery/sense motive checks that are as high as possible. No casting.

Initial Thoughts: Some Rogue levels, probably some Master Thrower and/or Bloodstorm blade? Exemplar or Uncanny Trickster? Swordsage might be useful here.

Red Mage

Lawful Neutral Human

Important Abilities: As many spells as possible, while still being competent in normal combat. And lots of points in Animal Husbandry.

Initial Thoughts: Factotum could do it straight out of the box, although in a perfect world he'd have a lot more spells per day.



Anyways, creativity encouraged and whoever comes up with the most "authentic" build(s) wins, I dunno, a haiku to their brilliance. This should be fun for anyone who's a big 8 Bit fan, and I have faith in the Playground's ability to get pretty close to the mark.

[Quietus]

Factotum/Chameleon would probably be best to represent red mage. He isn't actually shown casting a lot of spells, if memory serves - though Ice9 does stick out in my mind. Regardless, Factotum/Chameleon would really carry his "I can be anyone at any point" quite well.

[dgnslyr]

Hmm, Fighter would be some kind of Warblade. EWP lets him use whatever ridiculous steel death-dealers he'd like, and Warblades can change around weapon-specific feats whenever they need to. Wall of Blades lets him block most attacks with his impressive Attack Bonus, and the Diamond Mind save replacers make him massively resilient to everything else. From there, just pick maneuvers to taste, though Iron Heart is a must.

As for Black Mage, a sorcerer with Orb spells metamagic'd like crazy will do for nuking. As for knives, I'm drawing a blank as to how he'll work it into a Sorceror/Incantatrix build. Abjurant Champion and the like for some gishy goodies in melee?

Thief would be rogue for the skills, with swordsage and factotum mixed in to taste. It gives him versatility, skills, and leaves him competent in combat.

Red Mage would be some flavor of Bard, PrC'd to taste, with ranks in Perform (Insane Plan.) This gives him versatility as well as competency in both melee and magic. I like your idea of mixing in Factotum to taste.

[Midnight_v]

The BLACK MAGE

As for Black Mage, a sorcerer with Orb spells metamagic'd like crazy will do for nuking. As for knives, I'm drawing a blank as to how he'll work it into a Sorceror/Incantatrix build. Abjurant Champion and the like for some gishy goodies in melee?

The server was busy. Otherwise he wouldn't have been able to swordsage me. Still I have the Mailman (http://community.wizards.com/go/thread/view/75882/19868534/The_Mailman:_A_Direct_Damage_Sorcerer) on line 1. He's got his hadoken fully charged and holding.

There are feats that let you learn spells when your attacked by them. Spelltouched feats (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/variant/buildingCharacters/spelltouchedFeats.htm)

Lastly theres the heroics spell. That can grant you martial study on a whim, which might emulate some of what you're talking about and martial stance will grant you sneak attack. I think you can pour all of that into one build and still be a decent mailman.

The Fighter:
A warblade who takes all the crusader benefits from the school of nod dying aka Devoted Spirit.
Ultimately he should have the Immortal fortidude stance, and Strike of Righteous Vitality, likely Mind over Body as well.
Alternatively he could just be a crusader who buys immoral fortidude with a feat and takes a level of Swordsage or warblade to get all the best counters.
from those schools.

[Coidzor]

Sword-chucks = two-handed double weapon that he eventually learns how to wield in one hand.

Or possibly a one-handed double weapon that he at first just wields in two hands.

[Shpadoinkle]

I think Fighter would be some fighter/warblade/crusader multiclass, but not with more than a couple levels in fighter or crusader and advancing primarily as a warblade. Stone Dragon helps mimic his invulnerability to nearly everything.

Thief did a lot of ninja-type stuff long before he class changed; a few swordsage levels focusing around Shadow Hand would help with that.

Red Mage is pretty hard to pin down within the realm of 3.5e D&D, partially because he's multiclassed out the ass and has used some sort of trickery to get a decent attack bonus, the ability to cast in armor, and decent spell progression all at once. I'd start with Duskblade, drop the BAB to medium and restrict him to the Cure Wounds line of spells and a custom line that does cold damage, along with a handful of utility spells (Feather Fall comes to mind,) and give him at least Bard casting progression.

Black Mage is also something I'd have to call a customized class. I'd start with dragonfire adept (mechanically, anyway- barring Hadoken, his two most commonly used spells are Fire and Lightning, both of which the DFA covers handily.)

Lose:
- Armor proficiencies (and the ability to 'cast' in armor,)
- All weapon proficiencies except simple
- HD drops to d4
- Has to study his spellbook periodically (daily sounds good) or else he can't use his spells.

Gain:
- Higher damage on 'breath weapons' and a larger/longer area of effect (which he can alter on the fly as he wants, within limits.)
- Ability to take warlock invocations (at least one plot point hinged on him being able to cast Feather Fall.)
- Ability to use wands and scrolls as though he were a wizard of equal level.

Or you could just make him a wizard with blasty spells. Being able to zap and burn stuff all day sounds like something he'd be all over, though, and I can't recall any instances where he actually ran out of MP.

Hadoken is an ability he got from sacrificing innocents to a demon, so you'd probably have to look at the BoVD for something like that, which I don't have so I can't help there.

[Coidzor]

Or you could just make him a wizard with blasty spells. Being able to zap and burn stuff all day sounds like something he'd be all over, though, and I can't recall any instances where he actually ran out of MP.

He was all out of spells for the day in a strip near to the beginning of the comic, IIRC.