Best Archer Build

[Roguenewb]

What's the best way to get *a lot* of damage on a bow shot without any spellcasting ability on a build? I'm trying to get a solid amount of damage for flavor, and my own ability to optimize archers is apparently limited.

[Averis Vol]

off the top of my head theres hanks bow of force with splitting&collision enchants, then GMW to get to +5. then you can pick up ranged weapon mastery (PHBII) and dead eye shot for dex to damage at 14BaB (DCM). other then that ranged smite can throw on a few extra points. thats about all i can think of for completely no caster class. because of course theres always spells that can sky rocket your damage.

[Vegan Zombie]

Weapon enhancements: Collision, Splitting, Force (for DR)
Feats: weapon spec, ranged weapon mastery
Spells: Greater Magic Weapon, Flame Arrows, Arrow Storm

[Roguenewb]

Excellent start playgrounders, we got any classes that don't suck?

[Amidus Drexel]

Get a composite bow with a high Str rating

[Eldariel]

Any Elf (Fire Elf or similar preferred)
Level 1 - Ranger 1: Point Blank Shot, Precise Shot (Flaw), Weapon Focus: Longbow (Flaw)
Level 2 - Warblade 1:
Level 3 - Barbarian 1: Knowledge Devotion
Level 4 - Warblade 2:
Level 5 - Warblade 3:
Level 6 - Warblade 4: Extra Rage
Level 7 - Ranger 2: Rapid Shot (Ranger Bonus)
Level 8 - Fighter (Targetteer) 1: Arrow Swarm (Targetteer Ability)
Level 9 - Warblade 5: Weapon Specialization: Longbow, Improved Initiative/Quick Draw/Blind-Fight/Diehard/whatever (Warblade Bonus)
Level 10 - Warblade 6:
Level 11 - Eternal Blade 1:
Level 12 - Eternal Blade 2: Ranged Weapon Mastery: Piercing
Level 13 - Eternal Blade 3:
Level 14 - Eternal Blade 4:
Level 15 - Eternal Blade 5: Woodland Archer
Level 16 - Eternal Blade 6:
Level 17 - Eternal Blade 7:
Level 18 - Eternal Blade 8: Open Feat
Level 19 - Eternal Blade 9:
Level 20 - Eternal Blade 10:


Whirling Frenzy (Barbarian Rage Variant) [[http://www.d20srd.org/srd/variant/classes/classFeatureVariants.htm#rageVariantWhirlingFrenzy]SRD[/url]]
Targetteer (Fighter Variant) [Dragon 310]
Knowledge Devotion (Feat) [Complete Champion]
Woodland Archer (Feat) [Races of the Wild]
Ranged Weapon Mastery (Feat) [Player's Handbook II]
Warblade [Tome of Battle]
Eternal Blade [Tome of Battle]

Energy Bow (http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/ask/20061227a) with enhancements is the preferred bow. +1 Elvencraft Greatbow with Force [Magic Item Handbook], Splitting [Champions of Ruin] & Seeking (Collision [SRD (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/psionic/items/weapons.htm#collision)] or such as the last ability to taste) and appropriate Strength-rating (probably for your Raging Strength) will do in a pinch.

The principal idea is to stack Dancing Mongoose/Raging Mongoose, extra attacks from Whirling Frenzy, Rapid Shot & Arrow Swarm (and Haste) & company with ways to do multiple full round attacks (Time Stands Still-maneuver, Island in Time-ability, Moment of Prescience-maneuver, items). Then we add as much damage on each arrow as we can with stuff like Collision, Knowledge Devotion, Ranged Weapon Mastery, potential Power Shot from Hawk's Bow & co.

Maneuvers also give you versatility in terms of defensive actions and mobility (and utility stances, though the one you maintain most of the time is obviously Stance of Alacrity) & some great utility in e.g. White Raven Tactics. If you use the Spirit Lion Totem [Complete Champion] to trade Fast Movement (admittedly useful early on but as it doesn't apply for flight it diminishes over time) for Pounce, you also become a veritable melee threat in conjunction with Power Attack (you have a feat slot open, mind).

Either way, the point here is to stack as many attacks as you can without giving up much in terms of actual archery power. Remember to get Tiger Claw items of Dancing Mongoose and Raging Mongoose, and pick prerequisites while taking levels in Warblade (Hunter's Sense or Blood in the Water are both useful, and Sudden Leap is always good; those are the prerequisites I'd go with).

You should also get a natural weapon (Fanged Mask [Magic Item Compendium] is a cheap one) to be able to full attack (using Natural Weapon as secondary; don't need a target to perform an attack) and then refresh your maneuvers on your second round. Or have your DM relent and let you refresh after ranged full attack; either works.


On level 20, you can easily get 50-100 (depending on whether you count Splitting as extra attacks or not) attacks in a round by burning all your stuff. You can do that in ~5-6 encounters per day. Don't forget Phasing arrows either.

[Vegan Zombie]

Excellent start playgrounders, we got any classes that don't suck?

Honestly I think the only class that doesn't suck at archery is cleric, believe it or not. Pretty feat starved (and you will need Zen Archery) but their spells really make up for it

[Averis Vol]

there's always the typical swift hunter build. fairly competent with good BaB and some tasty skirmish.

[Invader]

off the top of my head theres hanks bow of force with splitting&collision enchants, then GMW to get to +5. then you can pick up ranged weapon mastery (PHBII) and dead eye shot for dex to damage at 14BaB (DCM). other then that ranged smite can throw on a few extra points. thats about all i can think of for completely no caster class. because of course theres always spells that can sky rocket your damage.

Wasn't there an errata for dead eye shot because it's a misprint and it's supposed to be +1 BaB?

[Flickerdart]

Check out Peerless Archer. If you can't get the Energy Bow, it's got the only other ranged Power Attack, plus lets you do a bunch of other archery stuff.

If you want the most attacks, though, then stick with dual-wielding hand double crossbows, with one of the many ways of automatically reloading them.

[Averis Vol]

Wasn't there an errata for dead eye shot because it's a misprint and it's supposed to be +1 BaB?

i dunno, i just got my copy of the dragon compendium, so there may have been, i'll check around.

EDIT: yep it was, good news.

[Soranar]

Go raptoran and get a footbow (1.5 STR to damage), a hank's energy bow version makes the STR bonus to damage unlimited.

You might have to go with a ranger build to get the archery feats for free and rely on zen archery for the to hit bonus.

dip fighter 4 for the weapon mastery feats

[Eldariel]

i dunno, i just got my copy of the dragon compendium, so there may have been, i'll check around.

EDIT: yep it was, good news.

I recall the errata also made it pretty useless tho.

[Invader]

i dunno, i just got my copy of the dragon compendium, so there may have been, i'll check around.

I know I've seen the fear description online with it only being +1 but I'm not sure if it was from an official source or not. I'm a tually using it in that dagger thrower build I got help with so I hope it's kosher lol.

[Averis Vol]

I recall the errata also made it pretty useless tho.

the erreta i read only changed the BaB req, nothing else. though i can't find a date for it so you may be right.

[Eldariel]

the erreta i read only changed the BaB req, nothing else. though i can't find a date for it so you may be right.

Ah. But it's still 30' and precision damage so might as well be melee; same problem with Swift Hunter really, sure you're an archer in name but you can't actually do damage at any meaningful distance.

But yeah, without magic the maximum attack damage really comes from volley, not a single shot. Though Deepwood Sniper [Masters of the Wild] + Peerless Archer [Silver Marches] + Crit Range Optimization (Weapon Master, Imp. Crit, Sniper-ability from Targetteer-variant Fighter) can lead to some decent one-shot one-kill style builds.

[Invader]

the erreta i read only changed the BaB req, nothing else. though i can't find a date for it so you may be right.

The source I found says its from dragon #304 and its written as dex to damage like you said but with only the +1 BaB. If that helps.

[Curmudgeon]

Dragon Compendium came out in 2005, which is a couple years after Dragon # 304. Plus that issue is (I think) late 3.0 material, and Dragon Compendium is updated to 3.5. The book (with errata) is really all that matters.

[Eldariel]

I forgot to mention, for a pseudo-Sneak Attack, Hit'n'Run Fighter [Drow of the Underdark] gives you Dex to damage within 30' against flat-footed targets. Trades away heavier armor and Tower Shields, stuff you wouldn't use anyways so definitely pick that up.

[Averis Vol]

Ah. But it's still 30' and precision damage so might as well be melee; same problem with Swift Hunter really, sure you're an archer in name but you can't actually do damage at any meaningful distance.

normally i could agree, but if your truly any distance away what are the chances the enemy is going to see you anyways? your damage could be a base 1d8 and it would eventually drop the enemy because whats the spot penalty at say, 110 feet, like -10 or 15? most enemies cant make that kind of spot. also, think a sec. how often in a dungeon do you get to be any meaningful distance away?

that being said there's quite a few ways to get respectable damage with an archer, even a fairly un optimized one. like right now i'm playing a paladin 6/ cleric 1/ shiba protector 1/ordained champion 2 who's hitting for 2d6+21 before power attack and smite. breaks down to 2d6(HBoF)+4(str)+6(wis)+5(colliding)+5(weapon enhancement via GMW)+1 sonic(Dragonbone bow). was it feat intensive? yes, was it expensive? yes, was it hard? not particularly. that being said i guess it does rely on 3.0/3.5 material so thats one argument for my build being invalid but my DM took pity seeing as archers tend to blow.

[Golden Ladybug]

I am almost certain that Dead Eye Shot was errata'd to BAB+1, but unfortunately, I don't have the Errata itself on hand. I'll do some digging.

EDIT: Found it, and yes, the BAB was errata'd to +1: http://paizo.com/download/dragon/compendium/DragonCompendiumVolumeIErrata.pdf

In general, I have three types of Archer Builds that I regularly use; Cleric Archers (which you probably don't want, seeing as you have asked for no spellcasting), Psionic Archers (as before) or Swift Hunters (who are boring as all heck).

In general, the best way of playing an Archer is getting spells that help Archery onto your build. Completely Mundane Characters just aren't as good at Archery when compared to someone who has even a small amount of spellcasting :smallfrown:

[Eldariel]

normally i could agree, but if your truly any distance away what are the chances the enemy is going to see you anyways? your damage could be a base 1d8 and it would eventually drop the enemy because whats the spot penalty at say, 110 feet, like -10 or 15? most enemies cant make that kind of spot. also, think a sec. how often in a dungeon do you get to be any meaningful distance away?

Someone with 10 Wis and no ranks in Spot has little trouble seeing 100'. Most monsters have very high Spot, too. And in dungeon, it's pretty damn stupid to be an archer in the first place. Being 30' away means you're in melee range (charge or move + attack are both doable within 30') except you're not melee and thus being in melee screws you over. At that point, why are you playing an archery build instead of a melee build, really?

Luckily, while dungeons are definitely common adventure locales, there are also the great outdoors where archery actually has a purpose. And generally even in dungeon adventures, getting there requires going through some wide-open areas.

[Eurus]

Yeah, the biggest advantage of archery is an unfortunately situational one. That's why it tends to see more use on the DM's side, where you have more control of things like terrain.

[Eldariel]

Yeah, the biggest advantage of archery is an unfortunately situational one. That's why it tends to see more use on the DM's side, where you have more control of things like terrain.

Though as long as campaign is open-ended (campaigns to the effect of "here's a world, you're fighting this and this faction for this and this reason with these and these allies") you can generally choose your battlefields fairly easily and make sure you can use archery. Phasing Arrows also help a ton, being able to pass through 5' of solid matter; great for peppering people from safety in dungeons especially before everybody becomes able to walk through walls. Too bad they're Dragon material too...

But eh, I've played multiple modules and original campaigns with archers and it's generally been useful at least the vast majority of the time; Expedition to the Demonweb Pits, Red Hand of Doom & Expedition to Castle Ravenloft for instance all had tons upon tons of open areas and dangerous, ranged enemies against which Archery shines (hell, in Demonweb Pits my Dervish had a ton of issues specifically 'cause he wasn't a competent archer so a certain gang of flying demons basically negated him since 90' fly speed just isn't enough against ranged enemies splitting up).

[Averis Vol]

who plays an archer who stand in LoE for charging? thats what meat shie--crusaders are for, they block the angry guys with sharp sticks from hitting the guys without sharp sticks :smallbiggrin:. plus as much as i love melee i occasionally like to branch of into different combat styles. i can't play the same kind of character every time, it gets under my skin (i also play in a fairly low op group so i have a lot of leeway with combat styles, i'm pretty sure if i played in a game that you normally partake in i would stand a snowballs chance in hell of staying relevant.)

[Eldariel]

who plays an archer who stand in LoE for charging? thats what meat shie--crusaders are for, they block the angry guys with sharp sticks from hitting the guys without sharp sticks :smallbiggrin:. plus as much as i love melee i occasionally like to branch of into different combat styles. i can't play the same kind of character every time, it gets under my skin (i also play in a fairly low op group so i have a lot of leeway with combat styles, i'm pretty sure if i played in a game that you normally partake in i would stand a snowballs chance in hell of staying relevant.)

My point is, if you're gonna play an archer, make a proper archer, not a 30' archer. :smalltongue:

[Averis Vol]

My point is, if you're gonna play an archer, make a proper archer, not a 30' archer. :smalltongue:

ohh definately, i'm not advocating relying on being within 30 feet, thats in fireball radius of everyone else. though i would like the merits of the 30' feet to be known, if your willing to take the risk, the rewards could be great. that's the price of doing damage, just like being within melee.

P.S. completely unrelated, i love being bane.

[Metahuman1]

Play a bard with optimized inspire courage and don't do magic?

[Averis Vol]

Play a bard with optimized inspire courage and don't do magic?

well maybe there's no spells, but there's enough magic in that pretty mans voice to kill an elephant.

[Golden Ladybug]

Speaking of being in a tough spot when in melee, a Bardblade with IC/DFI optimisation and an Elvencraft Bow would be pretty nifty.

Unseelie Fey* Silverbrow Human Bard 3/Warblade 5/Pious Templar 3/Warblade 9

32PB: 20 Str (16 Base, -2 UF, +6 Enhancement) 10 Dex (8 Base, +2 UF) 10 Con (12 Base, -2 UF) 12 Int, 10 Wis, 36 Cha (18 Base, +2 UF, +5 Level Up, +5 Inherent, +6 Enhancement)

1) Point Blank Shot
H) Charming the Arrow
F) True Believer
F) Weapon Focus: Longbow
3) Song of the White Raven
Bard 3) Song of the Heart
6) Dragonfire Inspiration
9) Rapid Shot
Pious Templar 3) Weapon Specialisation: Longbow
12) Words of Creation
15) Ranged Weapon Mastery
18) Woodland Archer

Assuming you have a Vest of Legends to bring your Bard Level for Inspire Courage up to 20, and a +1 Seeking Splitting Elvencraft Composite Longbow, +6 Belt of Giant's Strength, +6 Cloak of Charisma and X Raptor Arrows. Get Hasted. Have your Friendly Local Wizard cast GMW on your Bow

Round 1) Swift Action: Inspiration Boost
Standard Action: Begin Dragonfire Inspiration, using Words of Creation to double it
Move Action: Fly up as far as your wings will take you

Round 2) Swift Action: Inspirational Boost
Standard Action: Begin Inspire Courage, using Words of Creation
Move Action: Potter around in the sky for a bit

Round 3) Full Attack!!!

With 19/20 BAB, +13 Charisma, Haste, Rapid Shot, Splitting, GMW, Inspire Courage, Everything Bane Raptor Arrows, Weapon Focus and Ranged Weapon Mastery, this is your attack routine

+52/+52/+52/+52/+52/+52/+47/+47/+42/+42/+37/+37 (If any Arrows Miss, boost all attack rolls after it by 4)

Dealing 12d8+312+24d6+144d6, or an average damage of 954. That's enough to drop the Tarrasque in one round, with an attack bonus that guarantees you'll hit it on anything other than a 1.

Then you use Time Stands Still to do it again. Or, you use a Belt of Battle to get a full round action, make a full attack, and initiate White Raven Tactic's on yourself, make another full attack and then use Time Stands Still, if you're feeling mean.

*I'm not 100% sure this is legal; Unseelie Fey changes the Base Creatures Type to Fey, but doesn't specify whether the character's subtype changes as well. If the subtype changes, then no Charming the Arrow and you'd need to do some jiggery pokery with stats to hit stuff properly.

[Flickerdart]

You can't get Song of the Heart at Bard 3 with the bonus feat thing, because it requires Inspire Competence, which is what you'd have to give away for it.

[Red_Dog]

I just had to build few archers, so I might as well drop a two cents on "Coffee Elf" archer.

The idea actually revolves around ability to be about as effective in melee as you could at range.

Build is composed of one Elf, mixed with a dipping base=>

Few Barbarian levels[I would do just one, w/ Ferocity & any totem you like, but NOT with pounce. I prefer a "vanila" Barb and having my totem be a coffee been tree ^^],
Few levels of Fighter[Again, 1 or 2 w/ Hit-n-run substitution for feats],
1 level of Ranger at level 4
1 level of Sword Sage at level 5.

Than add as much Wild Runner as you have levels for. ^^

Build is very malleable and has 2 extra fighter feats. Over all, it should be quite fun and can be played in melee, melee+archery or just archery.

Elves + Coffee = there is no spoon = ]

P.S. Second Archer build that I came across in my building searchers, ended up being Ranger Cragtop archer who has a wand of Hunter's Mercy in his Bow and some way to Scry & a cohort of some kind that is capable of casting Snake's swiftness. You can Sub ranger for something w/ UMD or get third eye of scrying from Psionics.
*Alternatively instead of making Crit Hit every round, you can, give True Strike wand to said hireling and just buff your own Str sky high instead of Dex, as you are likely to hit with true strike+full BAB. This will probably yield over all higher DPS, and definitively higher Alpha.*

Basic idea is to get something 6/Cragtop Archer 4 to make single shot that auto crits from 800+feet... True .50cal sniper ^^

[Eldariel]

I just had to build few archers, so I might as well drop a two cents on "Coffee Elf" archer.

The idea actually revolves around ability to be about as effective in melee as you could at range.

Build is composed of one Elf, mixed with a dipping base=>

Few Barbarian levels[I would do just one, w/ Ferocity & any totem you like, but NOT with pounce. I prefer a "vanila" Barb and having my totem be a coffee been tree ^^],
Few levels of Fighter[Again, 1 or 2 w/ Hit-n-run substitution for feats],
1 level of Ranger at level 4
1 level of Sword Sage at level 5.

Than add as much Wild Runner as you have levels for. ^^

Build is very malleable and has 2 extra fighter feats. Over all, it should be quite fun and can be played in melee, melee+archery or just archery.

The build I posted is actually a fairly efficient mix of both; with Leading the Charge-stance, Bounding Assault maneuver and Power Attack + Pounce (or Pouncing Charge-maneuver for that matter) you can stack immense amounts of damage and Bounding Assault can initiate a charge while standing still. And then it has access to big swings like Diamond Nightmare Blade or White Raven Hammer.

[Red_Dog]

Eldariel=>

Yeah I skimmed thru your build. I just didn't see that it was also an elf [missed the eternal blade part]

So, let's take a trip to the tower? I'll get the bag = P

P.S. *EDIT* Re-reading ToB stuff in process. Also It seems, morphing into Arrow Daemon might help tremendously to double Mangoose attacks

[Golden Ladybug]

You can't get Song of the Heart at Bard 3 with the bonus feat thing, because it requires Inspire Competence, which is what you'd have to give away for it.

Eh, I've seen it debated that due to the language of the ability, you can. If not, remove the +1 to hit, +12 to damage and 12d6 Dragonfire Inspiration. That's still 900 average damage, and heading towards 3,600 damage when you go Nova :smallwink:

[Eldariel]

Eldariel=>

Yeah I skimmed thru your build. I just didn't see that it was also an elf [missed the eternal blade part]

So, let's take a trip to the tower? I'll get the bag = P

P.S. Jokes aside, Stacking attacks from Goose dance and targeteer is VERY clever. I suppose that goes into a folder of "successful ToB archer builds I found on the interwebs" ^^ Would it stack attacks from splitting too?O_o

The full attack sequence, assuming you aren't burning Island in Time and Eternal Training for a second Time Stands Still, would be:
4 Attacks (base) + 1 (Rapid Shot) + 1 (Boots of Speed) + 1 (Whirling Frenzy) + 2 (Arrow Swarm) = 9 Base Attacks. Arguably, Raging Mongoose gets multiplied over Time Stands Still too; I've seen readings both ways here.

Then we get two full attacks with TSS. That gives us 18 attacks, 22 with Raging Mongoose. Then we apply Splitting which gives us 44 attacks. Mind, we can also use our swift action for Island in Time and Eternal Training Time Stands Still again (still with a swift action leftover) for 18 more attacks. Then there's White Raven Tactics or Belt of Battle or whatever for more.

Using it for simple Belt of Battle for a normal full attack would net us 45 base attacks for instance, which Splitting would double for 90 attacks. That's a lot of rolling (at that point, just use a computer IMHO) and Woodland Archer makes missing pretty darn hard. Eternal Blade also comes with a built-in "Ignore DR for Swift Action" option which enables you to shoot efficiently without Force-bow too (in AMF or whatever) - that leftover swift action comes in handy.

Base To Hit is fairly poor with ~20 BAB+10 Dex+5 Weapon+3 Focus/Mastery+2-5 Knowledge Devotion and some random +1s like Competence and Haste; -9 from Rapid Shot, Arrow Swarm and Whirling Frenzy hits pretty hard and we're looking at maybe +33-+36 but Woodland Archer fixes that. It becomes fairly academic to one-round Hecatoncheires (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/epic/monsters/abomination.htm#hecatoncheires), which is kinda cool and scary at the same time (you need to overcome the Regeneration though to actually kill it, of course).

[Red_Dog]

Eldariel=>

Hmmm I am actually thinking, that if you are going with Mongoose/Targeteer than why not go with Soulbow Or suboptimal Dual HandXbow?

Soulbow will net you another set of attacks and double Raging Mongoose. You can still be an Elf for an eternal Blade, just probably slightly later. All you truly need is an ability of dual-wielding Composite Bows[much like arrow daemons can] which soulbow accomplishes in 3 levels which I think still lets you have 9lvl maneuvers.
*You do loose 2 points of BAB, but who cares? with fractional BAB its only 1 point and you are trading 1 BAB for silly amount of extra attacks ^^*
**On Silly amount of attacks, lets see, 7 base+1rapid+2swarm+1haste+4Raging Mongoose =15 base, TSS=30, Splitting=60. This is with Goose doubling thru TSS**

Dual HandXbow won't let you use sweet sweet strength so dmg will plummet, but it will be more of a "tamed" version of this ^^. On plus sides, with HandXbow you'll forget about melee weapon due to dipping into exotic weapon master at least once for close quarter range combat and consequently shooting people in the face at point blank without issues. ^^
*Also contributing to kicking ass, if you get +1 Quickloading Xbows you are likely to empty your clips[each has 100 bolts!] after 3 rounds, so bring 2 back up HandXbows ^^*
***EDIT. Actually I forgot, you still won't be able to empty clips in 3 rounds as half of the attacks come from splitting. So yeah, not as cool, but probably can be accelerated with belt of battle? Another advantage this build is an ability to tell people that your xbows have "full automatic" mode" = ]***


P.S. By the by, was there a maneuver in ToB that let you make additional attacks based on how many attacks you've made? Or was that Mongoose chain? I think that was it, hence my original misreading.

[Eldariel]

Eldariel=>

Hmmm I am actually thinking, that if you are going with Mongoose/Targeteer than why not go with Soulbow Or suboptimal Dual HandXbow?

Soulbow will net you another set of attacks and double Raging Mongoose. You can still be an Elf for an eternal Blade, just probably slightly later. All you truly need is an ability of dual-wielding Composite Bows[much like arrow daemons can] which soulbow accomplishes in 3 levels which I think still lets you have 9lvl maneuvers.
*You do loose 2 points of BAB, but who cares? with fractional BAB its only 1 point and you are trading 1 BAB for silly amount of extra attacks ^^*
**On Silly amount of attacks, lets see, 7 base+1rapid+2swarm+1haste+4Raging Mongoose =15 base, TSS=30, Splitting=60. This is with Goose doubling thru TSS**

Dual HandXbow won't let you use sweet sweet strength so dmg will plummet, but it will be more of a "tamed" version of this ^^. On plus sides, with HandXbow you'll forget about melee weapon due to dipping into exotic weapon master at least once for close quarter range combat and consequently shooting people in the face at point blank without issues. ^^
*Also contributing to kicking ass, if you get +1 Quickloading Xbows you are likely to empty your clips[each has 100 bolts!] after 3 rounds, so bring 2 back up HandXbows ^^*
***EDIT. Actually I forgot, you still won't be able to empty clips in 3 rounds as half of the attacks come from splitting. So yeah, not as cool, but probably can be accelerated with belt of battle? Another advantage this build is an ability to tell people that your xbows have "full automatic" mode" = ]***

Eternal Blade's capstone is absolutely godlike though (the whole class is amazing, hence picking it) and you need full BAB to hit it tho. Also, in order to get Time Stands Still as a picked maneuver, you need to hit Initiator Level 17 on level 19 (only 4 non-initiator levels max) as you don't get a new maneuver known on level 20 and ToB PRCs don't do swapping.

Though it's true, TWF gets you more attacks. It's hard to fit the feats into the chain tho and I always found TWF Crossbows less interesting than Longbows though so I haven't gone with that here.


P.S. By the by, was there a maneuver in ToB that let you make additional attacks based on how many attacks you've made? Or was that Mongoose chain? I think that was it, hence my original misreading.

Time Stands Still gets you multiple full attacks. So it does this, which is kinda why it's being spammed here :smalltongue:

[ArchangelAzrael]

If you can play a homebrew class I find this to be amazing for any nonspellcaster archer http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=229330

also here is http://www.minmaxboards.com/index.php?PHPSESSID=kmtjojtt902lsf1669oh61rl03&topic=2892.0 an archery handbook.

For a feat intencive build i like to take woodland archer tactical feat plus the two wepoan fighting feat tree plus the crosbows feat from the handbook I linked
and make insane amount of attacks at a low BaB but with each miss i get bonus on attack rolls and damage. on the last couple of shots you can hit a big Ac with no problem plus you do sick damage. :)

PS you use obviously handcrossbows (or aptitude greatcrossbows) and a way to reload them without using your hands.