[3.5] Kobold Gladiator

[Uncle Pine]

Hi giants!
I'd like to develop this weird idea I had: an evil kobold wich is a Thayan Gladiator.
Let's see the prerequisites:
Alignment: evil. Done (I like bad guys :smallamused:);
BAB: +5. Some fighter/barbarian levels will deal with this one;
Feats: Thoughness, Weapon Focus (natural weapon). For this, I'll assume that Improved Thoughness works like his lesser version (you know: Toughness is a very baaaad feat);
Special: Must posses at least one natural weapon + fluff requirement. Fortunately, web enchanced kobolds have two primary claw attacks and a secondary bite attack. Of course, I'll focus on claws :smallwink:

This Small guy is supposed to do heavy damages, but his natural weapons' damage sucks (1d3+Str for claws, 1d3+ half Str for bite) and kobolds have a huge racial penalty on Str. I think I could partially fix this somehow:
- first of all, artic kobold has only a -2 penalty on Str (which is still painful, but better than -4);
- kobold fighter gets +2 Con at 2nd level and +2 Str at 4th. With this, an artic kobold has no phisical penalties (it still retains +2 Dex);
- Dragon-wrought, Multiattack, Improved Multiattack, Rapidstrike and Improved Rapidstrike bring the number of attack per round to 7, at +20/+20/+15/+10/+5/+0 (claws) and +20 (bite) before adding any bonus;
- Thayan Gladiator adds another one claw attack using the highest base attack bonus (or two if I choose speed bonus with Imbue Natural Weapon);
- with an aptitude necklace of natural weapons from Savage Species, I can apply Improved Natural Attack (claw) and Improved Critical (claw) gained with Thayan Gladiator to both claws and bite.

Now I need to choose wheter boost damage with Str or Dex.
I could actually add half Dex bonus on damage using crossbow sniper and the aptitude necklace of natural weapons mentioned above, and 3 swashbuckler levels would grant Weapon Finesse and Int bonus on to-hit rolls, and I would even end with a useful ranged weapon, but I don't know if it's worthwhile.
In both cases, wouldn't some barbarian levels be useful? Whirling frenzy would even add a 10th attack!

[White_Drake]

You could go Swordsage to grab Dex to damage on unarmed strikes with shadowblade.

[Uncle Pine]

You could go Swordsage to grab Dex to damage on unarmed strikes with shadowblade.
I'm not familiar with swordsage and maneuvers, but does this works even with natural weapons? They actually aren't unarmed attacks...

[Urpriest]

I'm not familiar with swordsage and maneuvers, but does this works even with natural weapons? They actually aren't unarmed attacks...

You're correct, claws are a Tiger Claw weapon, but not a Shadow Hand one, so they won't work for Shadow Blade. That said, since you want to get your iterative attacks it will be good for your character to get Improved Unarmed Strike anyway, which would give Shadow Blade some utility. (An alternative would be giving up your bite attack to use a Mouthpick weapon).

[Uncle Pine]

You're correct, claws are a Tiger Claw weapon, but not a Shadow Hand one, so they won't work for Shadow Blade. That said, since you want to get your iterative attacks it will be good for your character to get Improved Unarmed Strike anyway, which would give Shadow Blade some utility. (An alternative would be giving up your bite attack to use a Mouthpick weapon).
Well, Small unarmed strike deals only 1d2+Str if I remember correctly, and I still get iterative attacks from Improved Rapidstrike so... I'll keep using claws, for now :smallbiggrin:
On the other hand, mouthpick weapons are just GREAT, I've actually never looked at beholder's equipment before! Thank you for the tip!
I had a brief look at the whole Tiger Claw discipline, and it seems that with Martial Study and Martial Stance I'd only be able to take an useless maneuver (claw at the moon, rabid wolf strike or wolf fang strike), though coupled with a very nice stance (blood in the water), which is really useful when you have at least 10 attacks per round :smallamused:
'Back on mouthpick weapons, Tiger Claw's weapons that can be "mouth wielded" are kukri, kama, handaxe and greataxe. For a Str-based fighter, I guess that greataxe would be the best choice, am I wrong?

[Urpriest]

Well, Small unarmed strike deals only 1d2+Str if I remember correctly, and I still get iterative attacks from Improved Rapidstrike so... I'll keep using claws, for now :smallbiggrin:
On the other hand, mouthpick weapons are just GREAT, I've actually never looked at beholder's equipment before! Thank you for the tip!
I had a brief look at the whole Tiger Claw discipline, and it seems that with Martial Study and Martial Stance I'd only be able to take an useless maneuver (claw at the moon, rabid wolf strike or wolf fang strike), though coupled with a very nice stance (blood in the water), which is really useful when you have at least 10 attacks per round :smallamused:
'Back on mouthpick weapons, Tiger Claw's weapons that can be "mouth wielded" are kukri, kama, handaxe and greataxe. For a Str-based fighter, I guess that greataxe would be the best choice, am I wrong?

You don't need to use Tiger Claw weapons. The Shadow Blade feat requires Shadow Hand weapons, but there's nothing like that for Tiger Claw, so if you want Blood in the Water you can use any weapons you like. Since Mouthpick weapons give you proficiency automatically without taking the feat, I'd be partial to the Spiked Chain.

[evil-frosty]

You could grab dragonwrought at first level then take the rapid strike and improved rapid strike feats(they are from the Draconomicon) to gain iterative attacks with your natural attacks.

[Uncle Pine]

You could grab dragonwrought at first level then take the rapid strike and improved rapid strike feats(they are from the Draconomicon) to gain iterative attacks with your natural attacks.
They are already in the wish list :smallwink:


Spiked chain is always great, although I wouldn't like to take all the AoOs' related feats, because I'm not going to use this character in a full optimized game.
I was also searching a way to combine Shadow Blade with claws while doing tons of attack, so I checked this (http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/rg/20070403a). According to the article, I could do unarmed attacks while using a single claw as an off-hand weapon.
This would let me to do:
- 4 unarmed attacks with +20/+15/+10/+5;
- 3 claw attacks with +20/+15/+10 (TWF chain + Improved Multiattack);
- 4 extra claw attacks with +15/+10/+5/+0 (Improved Rapidstrike);
- another 2 extra claw attacks with +20/+20 (Natural Weapon Mastery + Speed obtained with Imbue Natural Weapon).
A total of 13 attacks, plus those from mouthpicked spiked chain which I don't actually know how to calculate the bonus... Do they benefit from the TWF chain, even if I'm actually multiweapon fighting (unarmed attack + claw + spiked chain)?

[Urpriest]

You've only got two arms, so you can't do multiweapon fighting. You could TWF with claws and unarmed strike (you shouldn't be able to do this since claws are a natural weapon, but that article apparently made it possible), or with spiked chain and unarmed strike (using the claws as secondary natural attacks, and making your unarmed strikes with other appendages), or with spiked chain and claws (same principle as the first). Basically, TWF is only going to give you two sets of iteratives no matter what weapons you choose.

[Uncle Pine]

Would the Dragon Tail feat let me take multiweapon fighting?

[Urpriest]

Would the Dragon Tail feat let me take multiweapon fighting?

It's a natural attack, so nope.

[Uncle Pine]

Even if also using the Prehensile Tail feat? That would actually let me use my tail as an extra "hand"...

[Urpriest]

Even if also using the Prehensile Tail feat? That would actually let me use my tail as an extra "hand"...

With Prehensile Tail you could indeed take Multiweapon Fighting.

[kardar233]

Some good boosters for natural weapon combat:

Dip Bard (maybe take Song of the White Raven if you're taking initiator levels), get Dragonfire Inspiration and boost your IC bonus as high as possible. You can get up to 10d6 bonus damage per hit with just a small Bard investment and some feats/WBL.

If you can squeeze 9 levels in you can go for 6 levels of Warlock then Hellfire Warlock and take your natural weapon stuff (like the Thayan Gladiator's Natural Weapon Mastery, Rapidstrike etc.) on your Eldritch Claws for good damage.

[ThiagoMartell]

I'm not familiar with swordsage and maneuvers, but does this works even with natural weapons? They actually aren't unarmed attacks...

Beast Strike (http://www.realmshelps.net/cgi-bin/featbox.pl?feat=Beast_Strike)!

[White_Drake]

Yay, my post wasn't as utterly useless as was previously thought!

[Uncle Pine]

Woah, those are all very helpful tips! :smallsmile:
Yet, I'm starting to think that maybe I took too many feats in account...
For now, required feats are: Dragon-wrought, Dragon Tail, Greater Multiweapon Fighting, Improved Multiattack, Improved Multiweapon Fighting, Improved Rapidstrike, Improved Unarmed Strike, Martial Stance, Martial Study, Multiattack, Multiweapon Fighting, Prehensile Tail, Rapidstrike, Shadow Hand, Toughness (or the Improved one), TWF, Weapon Finesse, Weapon Focus (claw). 18 talents which are quite essential...

On the other hand, as a Fighter 10/Thayan Gladiator 10 I have only 15 talents! Fortunately, a single swordsage level would grant Weapon Focus, six maneuvers and a stance: in other words, 3 feats instead of 1 (from the 10th fighter level)
So now I have a Fighter 9/Swordsage 1/Thayan Gladiator 10 Fighter (progression Fighter 5/Swordsage 1/Fighter +4/Thayan Gladiator 10):

1st- Dragon Tail
1st- Weapon Finesse (fighter)
1st- Dragon-wrought (flaw)
1st- Multiattack (flaw)
2nd- Improved Unarmed Strike (fighter)
3rd- Improved Toughness
4th- TWF (fighter)
6th- Prehensile Tail
7th- Multiweapon Fighting (fighter)
9th- Shadow Blade
9th- Improved Multiweapon Fighting (fighter)
12th- Rapidstrike
15th- Greater Multiweapon Fighting
18th- Improved Rapidstrike

Doing so, I can't take Improved Multiattack. This means that I take a -2 penalty on claw attacks, but I think it's acceptable.
The only way to fit ALL the feats that I figured out is one swashbuckler level to take weapon finesse as a bonus feat, but I don't like to take too many classes "just because they are useful".

Now I have a question about TWF/MWF: normal penalties for fighting with more than one weapon are -6 with the primary hand and -10 with the off hand(s). TWF feat reduces the primary hand penalty by 2, and the off-hand penalty by 6, while MWF feat reduces both penalties by only 2 points? Am I right?
Assuming this, the attack routine would be:
- 4 unarmed attacks at +18/+13/+8/+3 (-4 penalty is from multiweapon fighting);
- 3 claw attacks at +12/+7/+2 (MWF chain + multiattack);
- 4 extra claw attacks at +7/+2/-3/-8 (Improved Rapidstrike);
- another 2 extra claw attacks at +12/+12 (Natural Weapon Mastery + Speed obtained with Imbue Natural Weapon);
- 3 attacks with the mouthpicked spike chain at +14/+9/+4 (MWF chain);
- 3 attacks with the "tailpicked" weapon at +14/+9/+4 (MWF chain).
If I am right, then take Rapidstrike and Improved Rapidstrike doesn't make any sense: it would be way better to take Beast Strike and Improved Multiattack.

EDIT: Just a question: what does "dip" literally means?