So your a Gish....

[DemonRoach]

....what do you do all day?

Or in the expanded, less nonsensical way of putting it:

How well do gishes actually work in play? It strikes me that your weaker at both melee and spell casting than a dedicated practitioner, so are you getting anything beyond the flexibility to change your mind from turn to turn?

If a specific build is required go for Sorcadin, it seems to be the one I see most (From memory Paladin2/Sorcerer 4/Spellsword 1/Abjurant Champion5/Sacred Exorcist 8).

Cheers! :smallsmile:

[Volthawk]

The way gishes work is that you use your spells to buff yourself for combat, so your casting works with your fighting, not being two seperate things you do, although if need be you can do other things with your spells.

[Amphetryon]

....what do you do all day?

Or in the expanded, less nonsensical way of putting it:

How well do gishes actually work in play? It strikes me that your weaker at both melee and spell casting than a dedicated practitioner, so are you getting anything beyond the flexibility to change your mind from turn to turn?

If a specific build is required go for Sorcadin, it seems to be the one I see most (From memory Paladin2/Sorcerer 4/Spellsword 1/Abjurant Champion5/Sacred Exorcist 8).

Cheers! :smallsmile:

Depends largely on what sort of gish you are; one of my favorites is Dread Necromancer 8/Crusader 2/Jade Phoenix Mage 10, which can choose to heal, scout, debuff, buff, minionmance, or engage in melee. Anima Mage also works well for all-day self-buffing melee. Others choose ways of making ranged gishes work perfectly well.

[GoatBoy]

your weaker at both melee and spell casting than a dedicated practitioner

The general consensus is that spellcasters are better at anything than anyone else. An equally levelled cleric or druid will inevitably outperform a fighter at straight-up combat. A wizard or sorcerer with minimal dipping/prc'ing to avoid caster level loss will do so as well. Even a straight wizard can summon something that fights better than a fighter of equal level.

People play gishes because melee combat is a staple of heroic fantasy, and they want to be able to do as such without falling into the usual "I full attack again" routine, or being shut down in the first round via hold person.

Gishes might not be as powerful as full casters, but anyone who doesn't play Pun-pun can be considered to be playing at a sub-optimal level for entertainment purposes.

[Essence_of_War]

They do pretty well in play.

They do melee better than many dedicated melee'ers due to their many and plentiful buffs, and their casting should have enough room (even on a sorcadin base) to cover some other tricks/cool things/dispelling above and beyond their personal buffs.

Some good buffs:
Nerveskitter
Shield
Enlarge Person
Wraithstrike (!!!)
Bladeweave
Heroics
The 4x Heart spells!
Haste
GMW
displacement
mirror image (+greater)
Ray Defelction
Bite of the werewolf
luminous armor
greater invisibility

[Saph]

A 3.5 gish typically has a lower damage output than a dedicated melee character, but much better defences. The standard Sorcadin will have much higher saves than a melee character along with better AC, better resistances, and a whole lot of other options. While their HP is slightly lower in theory, their arsenal of defensive spells means they're much tougher targets in practice.

A Fighter/Barbarian will put out higher DPS than a gish, if damage is all you need. However, the first Will-save-or-X is probably going to take them out of the fight, whereas a Sorcadin can shrug off multiple save-or-X effects without really noticing.

Since they can supply both melee damage and spell buffs, gishes are also less dependent on other members of the party than most D&D builds, making them good solo classes.

[DoctorGlock]

Well...

I get 8 hours of sleep... like a Gish
I prepare personal buffs and limited battlefield control... like a Gish
I have out of combat utility... like a Gish
I greater mirror image... like a Gish
I greater blinking... like a Gish
I persist my wraithstrike... like a Gish
I kill a giant fish man... like a Gish
I fly into the sun... like a Gish
My contingency goes off and I avoid death... like a Gish

Typical day in the life of a Gish.
Really, you can easily hold your own against traditional melee as well as having the arcane casting to keep in the game at higher levels, just have a few good personal buffs or cheap persist, stack your miss chances and go nuts.

At the end of the day, with the proper build you can get nearly full casting and still ubercharge. Add that to things like Giant size and various layered defenses and you become an engine of destruction that rivals the cleric and druid and you still get to be a wizard

Crusader 1/Fighter 1/Combat Conjurer 4/Spellsword 1/Abjurant Champion 5/Incantatrix 3 (or spellsword 1) and knight phantom X. You get CL 17, BAB 16 and free persists. Yeah, you stay squishy, but you hit like a hammer and things cannot hit you back

Where I come from, we call that "winning"

[Snowbluff]

Idk about a gish's dmg being subpar. Arcane Strike (It is a free action) + Power Attack + Spec into larger weapons (Power attack only goes so far...) + Arcane boost has to some messed up hits in this one campaign I was in.

[Bloodgruve]

For me playing a gish means that I can run into the fight, hit stuff really hard and have an answer for stuff when I need it. My Ardent will Animal Affinity>Claws of the Beast/Linked Force Screen first round, Second round dimension hop in for a full round attack. No I'm not Ubercharging but the damage is consistent and its a hell of a lot of fun to play. Just enough tricks to keep you busy.

GL
Blood~

[Saph]

Idk about a gish's dmg being subpar. Arcane Strike (It is a free action) + Power Attack + Spec into larger weapons (Power attack only goes so far...) + Arcane boost has to some messed up hits in this one campaign I was in.

Fair point. At higher levels, once they get Arcane Strike, gish damage output goes up by a lot. There's just a period in the low-mid levels where they get overshadowed (where you're still low enough for your lower Strength to be an issue, but not high enough that you have enough spell slots to compensate for it).

All the same, gishes are one of my favourite character types due to their toughness and how flexible they are. I used a Warblade//Wizard for the Neverending Dungeon (a high-op solo challenge PbP on these boards) and it worked very well.

[Eldariel]

How well do gishes actually work in play? It strikes me that your weaker at both melee and spell casting than a dedicated practitioner, so are you getting anything beyond the flexibility to change your mind from turn to turn?

Well, by the same theory without really talking about game mechanics, Gish's strength is versatility. Mages have real trouble (or should have real trouble; the fact that they don't is a flaw in the game system) if somebody gets to melee with them and can prevent them from going through the long and precise motions required to actually unleash their arcane power.

Warriors, on the other hand, have no access to the grand reality shaping powers and while they can be very capable in combat, their capabilities far as defeating magical obstacles, certain creatures or even protecting themselves will certainly be lacking.


Gish cuts the middleman and takes Mage but removes the natural weakness of magic often being impractical in combat. Further, a Gish is more than a Warrior or a Mage; it combines magic with swordsplay to create a whole greater than its parts.

Of course, in practice for 3.5 you basically end up a Warrior who's superior to Warriors far as combat capability goes, but inferior to Mages. Still better than truly pimped out Mages in Dead Magic Zone tho.

[Saph]

Of course, in practice for 3.5 you basically end up a Warrior who's superior to Warriors far as combat capability goes, but inferior to Mages. Still better than truly pimped out Mages in Dead Magic Zone tho.

Well-built Gishes are more than second-rate mages. Yes, spells are more versatile than melee attacks, but having an attack method which consumes no resources and works against anything not uber-optimised is useful. This is the real advantage of a gish: once your buffs are up, you can go through a hell of a lot of encounters without resting. (Being able to use their abilities in melee is, as you correctly point out, not a relative advantage of a gish. :smallwink:)

[DemonRoach]

Dammit....now I have to try one....

Cheers for all the responses, methinks I get it now :smallsmile:

[docnessuno]

Shortly put, if your gish is running around casting second grade fireballs and meleeing the enemies with no buffs when your spells run out, you are doing it wrong.

What i love about gishes is that they can funcion on multiple "power levels", allowing you to adapt to the enemy you are facing.
Up against easy-peasy opponents? just melee like a slightly sub-par fighter (your 24h buffs are still up and running)
A moderate challange? cast a few quickened buffs, baseline-swift spells (wraithstrike = win) and have fun being more effective than any non-ToB pure melee.
Hard stuff incoming? As above, but feel free to burn trought your spells, and to use arcane strike for extra hit&dam bonuses.
BBEG up ahead? Take one-two round to buff up with medium-short duration bufffs, and combine with the previous entry. After the fight look at the fighter and suggest him to max ranks in profession (beggar)

[JaronK]

You are -> You're.
"Your" is a possessive.

JaronK

[Rubik]

My egoist/slayer/ghostbreaker or shaper/constructor/ghostbreaker (with the Ectoskeleton power from Untapped Potential and EK: Metamorphosis) make for insanely powerful gishes that can mage-out just fine, since they only give up 1-2 MLs each (depending on if I want the capstones or not). If I want something a bit tamer, I can go with a psychic warrior. They're great for that as well.

[Psyren]

Another point to consider is that enemies have defenses too. Your ubercharger's massive damage means nothing to an incorporeal opponent if he lacks a magic or ghost touch weapon. You can try to trip a flying dragon with your spiked chain and bring him down, but without a way to increase your size your chances will be pretty slim. When your enemy dimension doors to safety, catching up to him without magic can be a chore, especially if he pops through a wall or ceiling. And vs. another gish, you can have a really hard time without dispelling his own buffs. And good luck fighting enemies with regeneration without magic.

In short, damage output isn't everything.