Gestalt Blackguard

[dantiesilva]

I'm making a character that is to go up against one of the most powerful gestalt build combinations made. A wizard/?//Factorum/? .

Both our level 40.

I was thinking of hitting where it hurts right off the bat and taking favored enemy arcanist and the mage slayer feats. But besides that I don't know what else to do to combat the build. I can see in the end winning the battle due to the fact that it will take forever for the other person to find and thus destroy my 5 jars that keep a dry lich alive. This is what I have so far. Please help me with feat selection.

http://www.myth-weavers.com/sheetview.php?sheetid=401548

[eggs]

Level 40 means that this is a joke.

That said, your current build isn't really designed to work in the level 17+ environment. The basic strategy at that point is to maximize your actions and just spam as many attacks targeting different defenses as possible, until you find the one immunity that your opponent overlooked. Your build looks like it can target Fear and Weapon defenses, but doesn't have much versatility beyond that, or offer many immunities of its own.

Assuming you want to keep 10 Blackguard levels, what with the thread title and all, I'd do something like:
Sorcerer 14/Wilder 7/[Marshal 1/Hexblade 3/Sorcerer 15] (swap out however you like)//Wild Shape Ranger 5/Swiftblade (advancing Sorc) 10/Blackguard 10/Planar Shepherd 10 (advancing Blackguard)/War Weaver 5 (advancing Sorc).

This would keep the defining Blackguard and Favored Enemy (Arcanists) portions of the build, but be better equipped for stupid levels like ECL 40.

The way it works is:
Go first via either initiative (via Reserves of Strengthed Moment of Prescience+Dex+Cha+Cha) or your absolutely absurd number of Reserves of Strengthed Contingencies, then use Swiftblade+Planar Shepherd+[Timestop+Delay Spell]+Shapechange (Cloaker)+War Weaver+Imbue Familiar with Spell Ability+Arcane Spellsurge+[Greater] Arcane Fusions+Linked [Hustle+Twinned Synchronicity] to basically take as many actions as you like. Just poke at the other character by going down your spell list and finding which defense the other player overlooked. Then use the rest of your 500 or so actions per turn to spam that defense until the other character breaks.

[dantiesilva]

And how does that stop a A wizard/?//Factorum/? that does that better? Please tell me? Better yet tell me how stop any mind effecting ability, or fortitude save from effecting me is bad. Orr better yet how dealing 1d10+25+20d6 in one hit. O wait and if you are that close to do that that they also take 20d4 negative energy damage and 4d6 divine damage, and that is a normal non magical weapon. So let me see

26 to 35+ 20 to 120+20 to 80+4 to 24=259 damage not including favored enemy at best without magic.
damage at worst. This also does not include having improved critical and keen making a crit anywhere between 15-20 means x2 damage.

Add in hordes of undead,a dragon, taking half damage at worst from any spell, I don't see where this is ineffective, and O wait Dry lich so you have to find all 5 of my life things to kill me for good.

[dantiesilva]

And how does that stop a A wizard/?//Factorum/? that does that better? Please tell me? Better yet tell me how stop any mind effecting ability, or fortitude save from effecting me is bad. Orr better yet how dealing 1d10+25+20d6 in one hit. O wait and if you are that close to do that that they also take 20d4 negative energy damage and 4d6 divine damage, and that is a normal non magical weapon. So let me see

26 to 35+ 20 to 120+20 to 80+4 to 24=259 damage not including favored enemy at best without magic.
damage at worst. This also does not include having improved critical and keen making a crit anywhere between 15-20 means x2 damage.

Add in hordes of undead,a dragon, taking half damage at worst from any spell, I don't see where this is ineffective, and O wait Dry lich so you have to find all 5 of my life things to kill me for good.

[deuxhero]

1:Paladin of Tyranny 3/Hexblade (dark Companion) 4/Blackguard x/Entropmancer x
2:Sorcerer/Sorcerer PRCs

Done! The first build isn't bad as a standalone either. Add some Duskblade once you have the needed class features so you can channel your sorc spells.

[eggs]

You sound upset. I'm not attacking you. I'm just your build isn't a threat to the build you're using it to oppose.

And it's not - You don't have a way to ensure that the damage hits (no matter how much it is), nor any way of ensuring that it affects the wizard, even if the attacks land. And if damage doesn't work, your other attacks are mostly Necromancy spells - trivially ignored with the Construct type.

On Dry Lich, there's nothing wrong with it. Its immunities are a good start. But its benefits are also dirt cheap at ECL 40 - an item of continuous Veil of Undeath is pocket change, and that doesn't collapse when you shapeshift. And immortality stopped being anything special back around ECL 15.

And yes, I'd consider my build to be as likely to beat the Wizard//Factotum as the Wizard//Factotum is of beating it. The two deciding factors would be which player made an oversight when running their character down the checklist of immunities, and which player has the first bad run of die rolls.

If you want your build to compete, get it more actions, more initiative/contingencies, a wider variety of offensive effects, and immunity to every attack/spell/effect. Making 1 attack well, and being protected from 2-3 attack types doesn't cut it.

[Daftendirekt]

This also does not include having improved critical and keen making a crit anywhere between 15-20 means x2 damage.


Regardless of anything else in your build, improved critical and keen do not stack.

[dantiesilva]

make it a brilliant energy weapon and it is almost garented to hit. How would construct type have to deal with a specialized blaster summoner wizard? Summons demons, and blasts with explosive meteor shower.

As for stopping it from doing major damage a mytral to stop epic level spells. The feat mage slayer, Pierce magical concealment, Pierce magical protection. Take practiced spellcaster 3x to counter act the effects of the three feats. Improved favored enemy (+3 damage), Power critical(4 less to confirm a crit), Awesome smite( to overcome DR, miss chance, and free trip attempt), Destruction devotion to get rid of there armor by 2 per hit. Law devotion (+7 on attack rolls), Savvy rogue( + 2 reflex and will), Improved smiting ( +1d6 damage, and gains alignment for overcoming DR), DMM.

That seems like good feats to me and thats not using any of the epic ones yet

[dantiesilva]

And after adding feats I have a 31 cha. Can turn outsiders, can control 10xHD of undead all allies within 100 feat also give off an aura of despair so thats -2 per undead i control + the -4 i give to saves meaning you can't succeed on a fear save against me. And zone of animation which lets me constantly have an endless supply of undead. For every weak undead they kill I get a demon that is now under my control or is a skeleton or zombie.

[Kazyan]

Your save DC for that fear effect is impressive, but not even the Fighter 40//Barbarian 40 will care about it. Mind Blank is a flat-out immunity, and everyone has a Third Eye Conceal with the WBL available at ECL 40.

[dantiesilva]

One problem, Dread witch, no one is immune to fear, and there fear powers my spells, or grants me more spells. Either works for me.

[eggs]

At this level, immunities to death or weapon damage aren't hard to get (Starmanle Cloak+Evasion, regeneration+veil of undeath, Dealy Death shenanigans, etc). It doesn't matter how hard a character can hit that defense, the option still has to be present to hit others.

You can't take practiced spellcaster 3 times, but even if you could, Pierce Magical Concealment doesn't negate the caster's defenses. In the most trivial sense, you need to be able to make an attack without being dimension locked+forcecaged as an immediate action.

I don't know why you treat construct type as if it automatically makes the target weak. Something like a Reserves of Strengthed Shapechange into a Mithril Golem yields construct type, magic immunity and an extra standard action per round.

Dread Witch is useful, since fear effects aren't clumped into most of the all-purpose healing contingencies, but even with pierce magical concealment, it doesn't ensure that the attacks will land (due again to the Wizard/Factotum owning the action economy) and even landing the Panicked status isn't a game-ender - all it takes is a level 1 spell effect to negate it. Have a backup plan, in case that defense isn't overlooked.

Basically, you're on the right track, but if this player is optimizing for an arena, quitting early to congratulate yourself doesn't mean winning. You have 2 main attacks - one which you can expect to meet immunities, one which is more difficult - but not impossible - to negate. Get more attack methods, so you don't have to bank on that oversight. And there's still the problem with winning initiative - if the Wizard is allowed to go first, it will win; it currently has more resources to dedicate to winning that initiative than your build does. (At very least, least modify equipment for that environment - a Drake Helm with shards for things like Moment of Prescience, Foresight, Celerity, Timestop, Greater Arcane Fusion and Arcane Spellsurge; add some Crown of the White Raven-type enhancements to other items - even at 150% cost, 18k for White Raven Tactics+Iron Heart Surge+Wall of Blades is dirt cheap; and a belt of Battle).

[dantiesilva]

So basically get tones of magic items that open up things for me. Like armor that grants me resistance to everything 30, and is made of mithral so that it is light. A shield with the same ability stuff means thats 60 energy resistance to everything. But still leaves open my water weakness and positive energy weakness. Now I'm not great with magic items so is there one that puts a globe of negative energy around you that way I would be constantly healing and blocking positive energy at the same time?

Saying the feat Power critical reduces crits by 4 and is a different sorce then the weapon ability keen they as well stack for a total of +6 off of crits for 13-20/x2 If it can get lower that is pretty cool but not major saying its a wizard and they can get miss chances, to negate that would ghost touch work? If so add in bane chaos and evil saying them are the alignments of the oppostise player. Both of them add onto the hefty swing I already have, add the lawful descriptor to the blade for more damage. As well as shocking and flaming.

Each and every single one of those tome's/ books that grant +4 to abilities after reading, as well as items that do the same thing, add +10 epic boots of dexterity, with an advancement on movement as well so as well as making it easier for me to win initiative, it also raise my defense. Gloves of strength and dexterity epic. Cloak of cha and wis epic, Helm of fireballs + int epic. Is this looking better or worse?

[Kazyan]

...add +10 epic boots of dexterity, with an advancement on movement as well so as well as making it easier for me to win initiative, it also raise my defense. Gloves of strength and dexterity epic. Cloak of cha and wis epic, Helm of fireballs + int epic. Is this looking better or worse?

Good idea executed in the wrong way. A Circlet of Epic Intellect +10 will set you back 1 million gold, which isn't huge at level 40, but are you sure you can't get lots of stat boots without dealing with the epic multiplier? For exmaple, why not buy reslotted Horseshoes of Flame? Reslotted to be similar to an Ioun stone, they'll give you +10 untyped Int for a fraction of the cost, and all you have to do is use UMD and change back into your normal body. Then equip your Circlet of Intellect +6.

Do whatever you need to do to become immune to (indirect object here). Cowl of Warding, universal energy immunity--see if you can pull it off without the expensive ring--a combination of Regeneration + Immunity to Nonlethal Damage + Immunity to the Regeneration Exception, Soulfire armor, the ability to say "no" to ability damage and drain, and make sure you don't need to breathe and can't be dazed. At the minimum. Because if you miss any of these, you will die during the Wizard//Factotum's Greater Celerity action that he cast when you won initiative.