3.5 Scout Skirmish Optimizing

[hogosha16]

I've been playing a scout for the DnD adventure Red hand and i cam across the Skirmishers boots and was like WOW!!! How come i have never seen this before?! Basically i am looking for abilities that optimize on the scouts ability to skirmish be it feats or magical.

1)Imp. Skirmish- +2d6/+2 AC when moving 20'
2)Skirmishers boots- +2 skirmish dam/ Swift action 2 day after moving 10' extra standard att.
3)Point Blank- +1 att/dam
4)Divine Charge- requires 3 feats to get but has 3d6 dam

[Voyager_I]

Check out the Swift Hunter's Handbook. (http://dictummortuum.blogspot.com/2011/09/swift-hunters-handbook.html)

In brief, there's a feat that allows you to stack Ranger and Scout levels for determining your Skirmish and Favored Enemy progression. It also allows you to apply precision damage (aka Skirmish) to Favored Enemies that are normally immune, such as constructs or undead.

The guide also gives ideas as to how to reliably trigger your Skirmish damage, since you are looking at a build that wants to move and full attack every round; two things that are mutually exclusive without some clever character design.

[gbprime]

If you can combine a high flight move and 3 more feats, you can get Diving Charge (for up to +3d6 more) and Improved Flyby Attack Great Flyby Attack, allowing you to skirmish everyone in your flight path each round.

Raptorans can pull this off, as can anyone with the Winged template (Savage Species).

EDITED to put in the correct feat name.

[Jodah]

As voyager says, its harder to get full attacks and precision damage, so my favorite way to op skirmish is to not take more than 3 scout levels. Instead of swift hunter, I take swift ambusher and a the rest rogue (stack scout and rogue levels for skirmish, stack skirmish and sneak attack dice for feat prereqs). Basically, for slightly less HP and lower BAB you can get a ton more d6 to add to your hit and run tactics.

That said, swift hunter is a glorious feat as well, as the higher BAB makes it easier to his with rapid or many shot and their ilk.

There is also (improved) acrobatic skirmish (+1d6 (2d6 for improved) for moving through their square and avoiding AoO), improved skirmish (+2d6 and +2 AC for moving 20ft instead of 10), and ranged skirmish (can skirmish at 60ft).

[Red_Dog]

If you can combine a high flight move and 3 more feats, you can get Diving Charge (for up to +3d6 more) and Improved Flyby Attack, allowing you to skirmish everyone in your flight path each round.

Raptorans can pull this off, as can anyone with the Winged template (Savage Species).

I've just re-read Improved Flyby. Its still seems like only one attack on the go to me. Not Full attack on the go.


Normal: Without this feat, you can take a partial action either before or after your move. Even with the Flyby Attack feat, you incur attacks of opportunity for moving through areas threatened by the target of your flyby attack.

Yes normal Flyby attack is infinitely better than say spring attack due to not having annoying reqs. But that still doesn't explain how are you getting full attack during your move?O_o


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Also, yes, you don't provoke AoOs with Improved Flyby. But in some builds you want to provoke tons of AoOs [elusive target scout]. In fact, Raptorians are AMAZING at provoking AoO for elusive target as you can fly above more people and not care about any terrain features and etc.

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On the topic. OP, besides the what you've mentioned here are few methods I know of[quite a few are in the handbook that was linked]=>

=>Greater Manyshot. Only at 30' feet still, but does let you dish out precision damage PER arrow which is great.
=>Splitting arrows from champion of ruin. Doubles arrows, all separate attack rolls, all get Skirmish, combine with Greater Manyshot for MORE DAKKA.
=>Travel devotion. Combine with turn undead+nightsticks for unfair advantage ^^
=>Belt of Battle & Quicksilver boots. Simple as all hell. Get free move actions = ??? = profit! These 2 items cost around 15k[mostly due to the belt, boots are cheap] and provide 5 free move actions per day.
=>Tormtor School from DotU. Get a free swift action attack if you use javelin in melee. Also get to use Javelin in melee with no minuses. Combine with brutal throw for massive SADness.
=>Barbarian Pounce Dip. Cheap? Yes. Effective? You bet your rear-end it is! Charge is a move. Dip into whirling frenzy or frantic rage[the one from city scape] and you are good to go.
=>10ft step w/ Tumble40 from Oriental adventures[I think?]. There are ways to get 10ft steps. This is one of them. Not everyone play with that setting. I don't for example. But yeah, 10ft steps. However that does make improved skirmish useless. Which is why I, personal never go with 10ft steppin' no matter the source. But a lot of people love it ^^.
=>Elusive Target+Improved Trip. Provoke AoO, if they miss, you trip[they can't trip back], than if you tripped them, smack them w/ skirmish! ^^ Due to needing 5 feats for the combo[less with dips, and items(armor of mobility)] you will need to be a melee Scout.

Special Mention goes to Crossbow Sniper. While needing a blasted weapon focus[if you are dipping cloister cleric, you can try to pick up War for free weapon focus], this feat extends your range of Skirmish/sneak attack to 60'[Win!] and adds 1/2dex to dmg[meh, ok I guess ^^]. With +1Quickloading crossbow that you should be able to afford by the time you will actually get to make more than one attack saves you a feat[no need for rapid reload] ^^.

There is probably more, I do not recall them at this moment.

[gbprime]

I've just re-read Improved Flyby. Its still seems like only one attack on the go to me. Not Full attack on the go.

Oops. I meant Great Flyby Attack instead. My bad.

[Red_Dog]

Oops. I meant Great Flyby Attack instead. My bad.

Yeah... Greater Flyby is more like it. And its just plain silly with Shadow blade + Hit-n-Run fighter. All you need is some concealment[we all know, that's not hard] and Bam! DEXx2 and Dex=attacks. Heck, child of shadows gives concealment, and Shadow Blade suggests that you dipped Swordsage and there fore have it.

This combo makes an excellent Dive bombing scout[can you spalsh roof jumper in there due to elevation drop?O_0]. Heh... the combo seems attractive to use en mass for my campaign... but I don't think I will. Its a bit TOO effective on an open field....

*Yes, yes it no more broken than T1-3, but I gave up measuring things against yardstick.*

p.S. Funny part about that feat is that you do not need Improved Flyby... Was that a typo?O_0

[Flickerdart]

A single attack, skirmish or no, is not going to be useful, because it doesn't kill anybody that was a concern to begin with. You would be much better off focus-firing.

[Fax Celestis]

Two words: Highland Stalker.

[gbprime]

A single attack, skirmish or no, is not going to be useful, because it doesn't kill anybody that was a concern to begin with. You would be much better off focus-firing.

10d6 plus change to everybody in a line is good, but not killer, you're right. That's why I'd mix in a little Boomerang Daze and an Aptitude Weapon. That's a tough save to make when you're doing 40 damage per target...

[Flickerdart]

10d6 plus change to everybody in a line is good, but not killer, you're right. That's why I'd mix in a little Boomerang Daze and an Aptitude Weapon. That's a tough save to make when you're doing 40 damage per target...
35 damage isn't good, especially considering the amount of effort you spent getting to that point. At level 20, nobody cares about 35 damage. And in that combo, Boomerang Daze is what's doing all of the work.

[Person_Man]

Trying to optimize Skirmish is like trying to optimize a Monk. You pour a lot of effort into it, but get very little in return. Skirmish damage just doesn't scale very well. It's also very boring, since you take the exact same action (move, make a full attack) almost every single round of every combat.

Having said that, the basic formula is to:

Get lots of Skirmish dice, by playing a Scout, Scout/Ranger with Swift Hunter, or Scout/PrC/PrC (there are a few that offer Skirmish).
Get free movement (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=103358) of some sort, so that you can always take a full attack action every turn. There's bunch of different ways to get a extra 5 ft step or Immediate/Swift action movement and/or Pounce.
Get lots of attacks (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?p=7066595).


I would also suggest that you focus on melee, instead of ranged combat. Ranged combat requires a massive 3-6ish Feats to work well (Point Blank Shot, Precise Shot, Rapidshot, Manyshot, Greater Manyshot, Improved Precise Shot). You can get a much better value with melee.

[Red_Dog]

A single attack, skirmish or no, is not going to be useful, because it doesn't kill anybody that was a concern to begin with. You would be much better off focus-firing.

If that was respond to my comment, I just wanted to clarify that while on a normal character its fine [weak-ish even by 20], in my situation its unbelievably good as NPCs come in packs of 20+ usually. Even a single unit of say 10 lvl8 raptorians/other fliers with this can decimate a unit per turn => in turn making them very very potent combatants on open field. A change of field [to underdark for example] would cut this nonsense short... but in my setting, open fields are probably where a lot of big fights will be fought.

But you right^^, in normal party mechanic, its very balanced. A bit sad that it really makes some fighters cry [with them being limited by BAB and you by DEX] but otherwise, its balanced.

P.S. I might find a better candidate to balance them a bit out against other armies.

[Flickerdart]

Um, no. A single CL10 Lightning Bolt is better than this build at 20, without any optimization at all. When core blasting spells cast by someone half your level are better than you, you know that it isn't a good build.

[gbprime]

35 damage isn't good, especially considering the amount of effort you spent getting to that point. At level 20, nobody cares about 35 damage. And in that combo, Boomerang Daze is what's doing all of the work.

Actually, thats by level 12. Level 20 is more like 17d6. You want me to post the whole build, or would you like to wait and see it in an Iron Chef? ^_~

[Flickerdart]

Meteor Swarm does 24d6, so you've somehow managed to fall even further behind unoptimized blasting.

[gbprime]

Meteor Swarm does 24d6, so you've somehow managed to fall even further behind unoptimized blasting.

And you're comparing a scout to a T1 or T2 caster and expecting there to be some sort of parity?

[Flickerdart]

No, I'm complaining 20 levels of character to the worst 9th level spell.

[gbprime]

Okay then, what would you do with the OP's request to optimize skirmish over 20 levels?

[Yuukale]

I add to the above post the following doubt: how much damage by level 20 is good damage? I know it's possible with the right feats, to achieve tons of dmg in a, say, pouncing shock trooper shenanigans.
But what I want to know is how much dmg divides 'suckage' from 'this guy is optimized/efficient' ?

[gbprime]

I add to the above post the following doubt: how much damage by level 20 is good damage? I know it's possible with the right feats, to achieve tons of dmg in a, say, pouncing shock trooper shenanigans.
But what I want to know is how much dmg divides 'suckage' from 'this guy is optimized/efficient' ?

The answer totally depends on the campaign and available source material.

But the more important question is whether some characters are leaving others in the dust or not. It doesn't matter how much damage is being dealt so long as everyone has a meaningful role to play in combat. Party's main melee combatant dishing 200 points of damage a round is fine, unless the other melee combatant can't keep up. Then the DM has a problem.

Non-optimized examples... 6th level barbarian with power attack, cleave, and a 22 STR before rage. Put her alongside the 6th level Paladin with the 14 strength whose best trick is Law Devotion. The Paladin is dishing out +12/+7 for a d8+4 while the Barbarian is hitting for +10/+5 for 2d6+25.

The barbarian isn't being unreasonable, or even optimized! max starting strength, a +2 str item, a +1 greatsword, a couple feats. But totally outclassing the other guy whose job is melee combat.

[Flickerdart]

Take the same skirmish damage (17d6, you claim? That's actually something worthwhile). Now put it on, say, a Wildshape Ranger with your basic claw/claw/bite. That's almost 180 bonus damage right there. On something with 4 attacks (same Ranger with a manufactured weapon instead), you're taking down 1 Balor-equivalent per round (assuming that between your base damage dice and Strength score, you can scrape together 50 damage over four attacks, which is practically a given by this point). And every such opponent you kill provides you and your party with an action advantage, every round you do it. Haste and TWF provide two more attacks right there, allowing you to dust even beefier CR20 threats. And then there's Snap Kick, Braid Blades...

Plinking each individual Balor for the 60ish damage you would do with a Great Flyby is pointless, because it'll take you 5 rounds to kill anything, and you and your party will be taking flak from 'em for the whole of those 5 rounds.

[hogosha16]

I can see every ones point about how much the Scout class is under powered but that isnt why im playing. I am playing with my best friend and our wives so i want to play a game that is fun not that i can out streak them and leave them in the dust. I am having fun i just wanted some friendly suggestions for how to make him more interesting. I already deal the most damage in the party single hit but i can only hit once unless i use my skirmishers boots. I am happy with the skirmishers ability to play along with the party.

8+ skill points per level and skirmish which to me is more fun to use than a rouge. I play the skillful knife thrower. Its great but i like having a plan for later levels.

Current build-Lv 7 Improved skirmish/Point blank/ Precise shot/
(1d4+2strdagger)+(4d6+2 skirmish)

**Just for fun

[Jodah]

Random thought ... could playing a choker make this easy? Extra move action = move and full attack, no problem. Main problem I see is the fact that it doesn't have an LA listed, but could savage species fix this?

[hogosha16]

The savage species does show how to convert it into levels so yah it would work

[gomipile]

Isn't there an ability from somewhere which lets you make an attack against every single enemy you move past? I forget where it is from or what it is called.

[gbprime]

Plinking each individual Balor for the 60ish damage you would do with a Great Flyby is pointless, because it'll take you 5 rounds to kill anything, and you and your party will be taking flak from 'em for the whole of those 5 rounds.

That's why Boomerang Daze is part of the build. Without it, you're entirely correct, the build is only useful against grunts. But with it, each of those Balors needs to make a DC 70 Fortitude save each round to be able to take an action... because they're not immune to being Dazed.

The Great Flyby Scout isn't about being the main tank, it's about spoiling the action economy for the enemy's heavy hitters.

[Flickerdart]

That's why Boomerang Daze is part of the build. Without it, you're entirely correct, the build is only useful against grunts. But with it, each of those Balors needs to make a DC 70 Fortitude save each round to be able to take an action... because they're not immune to being Dazed.

The Great Flyby Scout isn't about being the main tank, it's about spoiling the action economy for the enemy's heavy hitters.
But then you don't need Skirmish at all. You can generate the 28 damage necessary to ensure an impossible save for the Balor just by looking at it really hard, at that level. The combo here is Great Flyby and Aptitude Cheese, not anything to do with the Scout.

[gbprime]

But then you don't need Skirmish at all. You can generate the 28 damage necessary to ensure an impossible save for the Balor just by looking at it really hard, at that level. The combo here is Great Flyby and Aptitude Cheese, not anything to do with the Scout.

Right, but all that extra damage ensures that you can in fact kill stuff on your own (admittedly in several rounds not just one), rather than just buzzing people until your friends kill them for you. It's more satisfying to a player to have that capability.

It's Bard Syndrome. The real reason unoptimized Bards are so unpopular is that nobody wants to be the negative modifier that allows other people to kick butt. They would actually like to kick some butt too.

So yeah, you can do the job with 8d6. But 17d6 just FEELS better. :smallamused:

[Person_Man]

Isn't there an ability from somewhere which lets you make an attack against every single enemy you move past? I forget where it is from or what it is called.

Paimon vestige (Binder 5, or Binder 3 with a Feat) or Desert Tempest maneuver (Swordsage 11, though presumably a high level multi-class build could also pick it up).