Stone Dragon Warblade?

[Zarake]

So, I'm trying to roll up a warblade who focuses mainly on the Stone Dragon School, but I have come at a blank for feats past the basic 2-handed weapon options.

Feats I'm sold on:
Power attack (duh)
Improved initiative
Imp. bull Rush
Shock trooper.


I'm starting at 14th level with no gear (plot reasons) and plan on going all the way to 20. Any help would be greatly appreciated.. Oh and first game is tonight :P

[flumphy]

Chargers, by definition, do damage by moving around. A lot of Stone Dragon stuff requires you to stay put. You probably want to focus on something else and dip into Stone Dragon selectively.

[Zarake]

I don't know what I was thinking there, shock trooper and imp. bull rush definitely out..

With that bit of house cleaning out of the way, any suggestions? This is a lot harder then building a normal fighter..

[Keld Denar]

I like Pierce Magical Concealment on my Warblades. If you are gonna drop a freakin mountain on someone, you want to make sure you hit them, and not some tricksy image. Mountains don't miss, so you shouldn't either. The advantage here is that you can get Blindfighting as a Warblade bonus feat. That means that you only really have to take Mage Slayer + PMC as general feats. Its not like there are a whole ton of amazing Warblade bonus feats. Combat Reflexes and Imp Intiative and...yea...

[Garagos]

Maybe Combat Reflexes and Hold the Line? That way you can let people charge you and still get an attack. Maybe a reach weapon too so you can hit more people without moving. Spiked Chain is always a good choice for reach/adjacent attacks, but there are feats that let you alternate reach/non-reach. I think there may also be a Knockdown feat chain that might not be bad for you. If you do enough damage you get a free trip attempt which will keep people from moving away from you.

[Zarake]

What book is that from?

[Keld Denar]

PMC and Mage Slayer are both from Complete Arcane. Hold the Line is in Complete Warior. Knockdown is in the SRD (a general feat, but grouped in with the divine rules).

[Cog]

Curmudgeon makes the argument that teleportation does not count as movement. (I personally disagree, but I feel either ruling is valid as long as you're consistent, and he's a respectable source.) If you go with that, you might want to pick up some teleports; either stealing one or two from Shadow Hand or a feat/level swing through Magic of Incarnum can get you some natively.

[Essence_of_War]

Specifically:

A 2-level dip into totemist to bind blinkshirt to your totem chakra gets you unlimited move action dimension door. Just be aware that it follows all of the other limitations of dimension door (your turn ends after using it).

A level or 2 dip in swordsage can get you access to 1 or more of the teleport as a std/move/swift action line. Since Swordsage also gets access to SD and DM, you can use this to pick up extra maneuvers in either of those schools that you missed as well.

[Cog]

A level or 2 dip in swordsage can get you access to 1 or more of the teleport as a std/move/swift action line.
I'd actually recommend against doing it that way. Pick it up by feat instead; that way you aren't stuck with Swordsage's lame recovery mechanic, and you gain the advantage of your presumably-better Warblade IL when picking them.

[deuxhero]

If you don't get the loot anyways, Stone Dragon works well with sundering.

[Eldariel]

There's the 1st level maneuver Charging Minotaur which gives you Bull Rush synergies but unfortunately there are no higher level Rushes. Stone Dragon Warblade should almost certainly wield a reach weapon to minimalize the fact that you can't move more than 5' in your stances. Strength-focus (there's some Strength-save maneuvers), perhaps some Trample-synergies, the basics. Also, since the school grants you DR in a couple of ways, it could be prudent to pick up ways to mitigate damage like Elusive Target [Complete Warrior] & Starmantle Cloak [Book of Exalted Deeds].

This makes DR quite efficient since without Power Attack and with the damage halved, you suddenly take very small chunks of damage which can be heavily mitigated or even completely negated by the DR. Few things can deal 40+ damage per hit without Power Attack.


The Tactical Feats is unfortunately kinda bland. It amounts to "if you use Stone Power for -5, ignore DR and Hardness and if you hit twice, you get no penalty on critical confirmations". Pretty boring and quite useless when you already have infinite strikes that penetrate DR and Hardness. And Crit Confirmation bonuses just aren't all that since they need you to roll a crit in the first place, and then fail to confirm it.

[Draz74]

Much as I hate to contribute to the world having yet another Shock Trooper, I have to protest that Stone Dragon is not all about standing in one place and being immobile. Its stances (except Crushing Weight of the Mountain) end when you move, yes, but it's only a swift action to reactivate them. Meanwhile, some other Stone Dragon maneuvers actually encourage you to move: Charging Minotaur and Mountain Avalanche.

Charging Minotaur is amazing at low levels, and can remain amazing if you combine it with some Dungeoncrasher action. Mountain Avalanche is amazing if you have a way to gain size increases (PrC to combine Psychic Warrior and Warblade? I wish :smallsigh:).

One option for a Stone Dragon-focused Warblade is to go for dedicated Grappling. Probably not what you're after, though.

[HunterOfJello]

If you don't get the loot anyways, Stone Dragon works well with sundering.

Maneuvers can not be used along with forms of special attacks. To quote page 43 of the ToB, "...you cannot combine special attacks such as sunder or bull rush with strikes, even if you have feats that make such special attacks more potent." The only exceptions are maneuvers that specifically state that they can be used for special attacks.

Luckily, there is a single maneuver that happens to be in the Stone Dragon discipline that can be used to sunder things with, Stone Dragon's Fury.

~

Zarake, you should start picking out your maneuvers and set up for feats appropriately. You should also pick out your maneuvers and see where your choices end up leading you before deciding that you will completely focus on one school or another. Most warblades end up focusing on 2 to 3 schools total since they don't have too many choices anyway. Remember that stances count as maneuvers for purposes of fulfilling prerequisites and try to grab enough low level maneuvers to gain access to White Raven Tactics and/or Iron Heart Surge if you decide to generally avoid the White Raven or Iron Heart schools.

Oh, and be sure to grab Emerald Razor so that your Full Power Attacks will always hit when you need them to.

[deuxhero]

I thought sundering was targeting an item instead of a person, not a special action.

[Keld Denar]

Sundering an unattended object is. Sundering an attended object like a weapon or shield involves an opposed attack roll, and thus is a special combat maneuver similar to a trip or grapple.

[Zonugal]

You know if you ended up doing a Warblade who used teleportation and Stone Dragon techniques you could end up modeling yourself off of a certain comic character...

http://longboxcomics.files.wordpress.com/2010/03/top-ten-wolverine-villains-20060509031718495.jpg

[Keld Denar]

Warblade PrC class with teleportation juju? (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?p=5883542#post5883542) Sadly doesn't get access to Stone Dragon discipline though...