Magic arrows?

[GutterFace]

Does anyone know of a PRC or good multi to take for a Scout to imbue his arrows with magic or something cool.....besides poison?

[Daftendirekt]

Honestly, the best thing for a scout is to take levels of ranger as well and then get the Swift Hunter feat from Complete Scoundrel.

[Urpriest]

Your bow already imbues your arrows with magic. What do you want your magic arrows to do exactly? Carry spells?

[GutterFace]

yes, like an arrow that does...lets say dex damage or slows....

[roguemetal]

Arcane Archer is good for imbuing spells, but you do need some levels in an arcane casting class.

Soul Bow is a psionic class which allows you to imbue your arrows with all kinds of stuff, but you do need two levels in Mindblade.

Other than that there are some options...

Vile Martial Strike is a feat that adds 1 vile damage to attacks. (BoVD)
Arrow of Bone is a spell that imbues an arrow with an instant death attack. (CA)
Smiting Spell is a feat that does what Arcane Archer does, but to slightly weaker effect. (PhB2)
Levels in Paladin will give you Smite, and you can always have the bow or arrows enchanted.

[Curmudgeon]

Well, I wanted to get into Arcane Archer (for a 2-level dip to acquire Imbue Arrow) from a divine spellcaster base, and came up with this build, heavily focused on feats.


Here's an archer build I came up with a while back, intended to get more archery-related feats in a mostly spellcasting build; it's got something for everybody. (Note: The cheesy bonus feat swap may be RAW legal, but I recommend it only if you want to antagonize your DM.)

Race: Wood Elf (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/monsters/elf.htm#woodElf) (+2 DEX, +2 STR, -2 CON, -2 INT; Favored Class: Ranger). Alignment: within 1 step of Chaotic Good. You'll need to join the Order of the Shooting Star (see Champions of Valor). This build requires DEX 17 by the time you get to level 6 for Dead Eye, and DEX 19 later if you pick up Improved Precise Shot.


Cloistered Cleric 1 of Solonor Thelandira. Domains: Knowledge, War, Elf; gain Weapon Focus (longbow) and Point Blank Shot feats as granted powers. Level 1 feat: Precise Shot. Should pick up 1+ ranks in Knowledge (arcana) and 4 ranks in Knowledge (religion).
Mystic Ranger 1 (Ranger variant in Dragon # 336, page 105). Gain wild empathy, Track feat. Should pick up 5 ranks in Survival.
Cloistered Cleric 2. Level 3 feat: Far Shot.
Cloistered Cleric 3.
Mystic Ranger 2. Take Arcane Hunter ACF (Complete Mage, page 32) to get Favored Enemy: Arcanists. Gain 3 more ranks in Survival to get 8 total ranks.
Seeker of the Misty Isle (Complete Divine, page 61) 1. Gain Travel as bonus domain; convert this to Travel Devotion (Complete Champion, page 62) feat. Level 6 feat: Dead Eye (Dragon Compendium, page 95): add DEX bonus to arrow damage within 30'.
Mystic Ranger 3. Choose combat style: archery; this grants the Rapid Shot feat.
Mystic Ranger 4. Gain Endurance as a bonus feat.
Seeker of the Misty Isle 2. You'll now have BAB 6. Level 9 feat: Manyshot.
Seeker of the Misty Isle 3.
Seeker of the Misty Isle 4. Do the Dark Chaos Shuffle (Fiendish Codex I, pages 92 & 95) to swap Track and Endurance for

Sword of the Arcane Order feat (Champions of Valor, page 34): cast Wizard arcane spells in Ranger spell slots; and
Holy Warrior reserve feat (Complete Champion, page 60): add level of highest reserved War spell to weapon damage.
You'll now have Cleric 7 spellcasting, BAB 8, and can cast Ranger/Wizard spells at levels 0-2.
If you want to spread on the cheese sauce, this is where you would do the Dark Chaos Shuffle with the 4 Elf bonus feats
Weapon Proficiency: Elves receive the Martial Weapon Proficiency feats for the longsword, rapier, longbow (including composite longbow), and shortbow (including composite shortbow) as bonus feats. and pick up Extend Spell, Persistent Spell, Divine Metamagic (Persistent Spell), and Extra Turning; persist Divine Power to keep your BAB up all day. Note: I do not advocate this cheesy tactic, unless you like having your DM smack you upside the head with gaming books.

At this point you qualify to enter Arcane Archer, or you can continue with Seeker of the Misty Isle for more Cleric spellcasting plus other benefits of that PrC.

With Divine Power you'll be at BAB 11.
You'll add (DEX mod +1) to attacks, and (with a composite longbow) (STR mod +4) to damage. (The +1 is from Weapon Focus; the +4 is from Holy Warrior.)
Within 30' you'll add an additional +1 to attacks, and (DEX mod + 1) to damage. (The +1 is from Point Blank Shot; the DEX mod is from Dead Eye.)
You'll have 10 useful feats (or 14 with the cheesy sauce added), without flaws. If at some point you think you've got enough skill ranks in the various Knowledges, you can convert Knowledge domain to Knowledge Devotion for bonuses to attack and damage against the corresponding creature types.

There's no support for Scout in the build, though.

[eggs]

Does anyone know of a PRC or good multi to take for a Scout to imbue his arrows with magic or something cool.....besides poison?
That's pretty much what Champions of Ruin's Justice of Weald and Woe is about.

[thriceborn]

Artificer infusions works on amunition up to a count of fifty, if they're all touching I believe. I'm away from my books for the time being.

[Airanath]

Can't a Sword of the Arcane Order Ranger make it into Arcane Archer? Can't remember the rules exactly right now...
I would say yes, as it never mentions the source of the spells they could very well be arcane. Worst case, SatAO Ranger 6/Wizard 1 would stack your wizard and ranger levels for your wizard spells and give access to AA still. So you would, at this level cast as a wizard 7, and Ranger 6.
Nevermind, forgot swifthunter doesn't also advance caster level... or you could get it all into a cute stack.

[Optimator]

Justice of Weald and Woe is perfect for this. Ranger spells also work, but it's a heavy multiclass investment to get the higher level archery spells and decent spells per day.