ShneekeyTheLost
2012-08-07, 11:21 AM
We all remember the Bag o' Puppies trick. Warmind5 lets you get a free shot on an opponent within reach if you hit an opponent. So you dump a bag of puppies at your feat. Kill a puppy, get a free shot. Combine with Great Cleave, and you have as many free shots as you have puppies in your bag.
Well, my friends, this is a new take on the old saw. Hold on to your hats, this one can clear whole armies.
Tome of Battle, Book of Nine Swords. A rather controversial book, and I am loathe to post this because of the negative views that will be directed to it. However, I would be remiss in my duty as an Optimizer if I did not share this with the class.
This trick is classified as Theoretical Optimization, and should not be used in a realistic game setting, any more than Mailman, Pun-Pun, or any other TO builds should be.
Having said that, the basic concept isn't too bad.
The PrC that makes this work is Bloodstorm Blade. The 2nd level ability allows you to treat your thrown attacks as melee attacks, with respect to feats.
Now Lightning Ricochet. Lets you mix your ranged and melee attacks. But of course, your ranged attacks *ARE* melee attacks, in effect.
So now then, we come to the trick. Great Cleave is often seen with ridicule (Roy has Boobies!), however this time, it gains some power back.
Take a swing, kill a mook. Great cleave. Now, you can swing at another mook... or you can use Thunderous Throw and hit anything you can throw your weapon at.
So now literally every enemy within range is your 'bag of puppies'. Boosting your damage to one-shot kill opponents is easy for a Warblade. This lets you clear entire battlefields.
At higher levels? Let me put it to you this way. Since Distant Shot only requires 20 ranks in Spot, and there's several ways to get Spot as a class skill, by level 17, he can literally clear anything within line of sight.
The Warblade stands atop the walls of Minas Tirith, with an army of goblins, Uruk-Hai, and Oliphants beneath him... so numerous that they seem a carpet of filth on the great plain. He hefts his greatsword and throws it.
Six seconds later, the plains are filled with corpses.
Every. Single Opponent. Dead. Including the Oliphants and the siege weapons.
This is even starting to approach the offensive capabilities (not defensive or utility, of course) of a God Wizard, because he is effectively using an area-effect no-save-just-die that does not allow SR, and is not considered to be a Death effect. How? He's simply doing enough damage to one-hit kill his opponents.
This also negates one of the biggest disadvantages melee traditionally has: 'how can you reach me'. Simple... I throw my sword at you.
It still doesn't approach the defensive or utility capabilities of a Wizard, by any means. However, a strong offense can be a good defense. If there is no one left to harm you... then you remain unharmed. It's not perfect, of course. A knife in the dark (although with Improved Uncanny Dodge, it will have to be a good deal more involved than THAT), or spells launched from outside of Line of Sight (perhaps using scrying to target).
But really...
Area: Line of Sight (no risking friendly fire)
Effect: 'Die now'.
Uses: Unlimited.
Yea... it's kinda like that.
Let's look at two builds. One of which is the 'Practical' version, the other is the 'Way Out There' version.
Practical Whirlblades of Death.
Human WhirlPounceBarbarian1/Warblade4/Bloodstorm Blade4. That's right, this is a level 9 character.
Feats:
Power Attack (1st), Leap Attack (Human Bonus), Improved Bull Rush (3rd), Point Blank Shot (Bonus Warblade5 feat), Shock Trooper(6th), Cleave (Bloodstorm Blade3 bonus feat), Great Cleave (9th).
No flaws. No fuss. No muss.
For this exercise, he will be using a +1 Valorious Ghost Touch Greatsword.
His other 'magic item' for this exercise will be having Enlarge Person cast an permancied upon him.
Now, this gentleman does have a somewhat limited range. He can throw out to 5 range increments, or 50'. That still out-ranges Warlocks, and he can strike any opponent within this range.
So, he charges an opponent. Doesn't really matter which one. The important thing is the charge. This activates Shock Trooper, and allows him to transfer the entirety of his BAB (+9) as an AC penalty, for damage boosting. He's dealing 4x this damage (2x because it is a two-handed weapon, then another 1x from Leap Attack, and another 1x from Valorous weapon enhancement) for a bonus of 36, just from power attacking.
By level 9, he will have +2 stat bonus from levels (one at 4, and the other at 8). So his Strength is 20. With a Girdle of Giant Strength +2 (all he could afford with his other two purchases), he's got a Strength of 22. That means an additional +9 damage from Str bonus.
He is also getting +9 damage from Leading the Charge stance, because he is charging.
This brings his bonus damage up to +54. +1 from the enhancement bonus makes a nice +55 damage.
Base weapon damage on a Large Greatsword is 3d6, for an average of another 10 damage. So he's doing, on average, 65 damage a hit. Pretty weak, for a melee build at this level actually. I'm sure other optimizers can significantly boost damage output.
More than enough to auto-kill 'mooks', but it might not be enough for larger enemies, which will require multiple hits to kill. Still, even so, he can hit any opponent within 50', and if anything drops, he gets a free attack. So he's still cutting quite the swath through opponents. He's also got three attacks (one from Whirling Frenzy, and his two normal attacks from having a BAB of +9).
This is the 'practically optimized' version which is more suitable for normal play. However, this may still be too powerful for some tables. As always, double check with your GM, and make sure you are not stealing anyone else's thunder.
Whole hog version to follow, or I can let one of the other optimizers build him. In short, he uses Dragonwrought Kobold to get early access to Epic feats. He also uses Blood In The Water and a Keen Valorous Ghost Touch Aptitude Falchion.
Well, my friends, this is a new take on the old saw. Hold on to your hats, this one can clear whole armies.
Tome of Battle, Book of Nine Swords. A rather controversial book, and I am loathe to post this because of the negative views that will be directed to it. However, I would be remiss in my duty as an Optimizer if I did not share this with the class.
This trick is classified as Theoretical Optimization, and should not be used in a realistic game setting, any more than Mailman, Pun-Pun, or any other TO builds should be.
Having said that, the basic concept isn't too bad.
The PrC that makes this work is Bloodstorm Blade. The 2nd level ability allows you to treat your thrown attacks as melee attacks, with respect to feats.
Now Lightning Ricochet. Lets you mix your ranged and melee attacks. But of course, your ranged attacks *ARE* melee attacks, in effect.
So now then, we come to the trick. Great Cleave is often seen with ridicule (Roy has Boobies!), however this time, it gains some power back.
Take a swing, kill a mook. Great cleave. Now, you can swing at another mook... or you can use Thunderous Throw and hit anything you can throw your weapon at.
So now literally every enemy within range is your 'bag of puppies'. Boosting your damage to one-shot kill opponents is easy for a Warblade. This lets you clear entire battlefields.
At higher levels? Let me put it to you this way. Since Distant Shot only requires 20 ranks in Spot, and there's several ways to get Spot as a class skill, by level 17, he can literally clear anything within line of sight.
The Warblade stands atop the walls of Minas Tirith, with an army of goblins, Uruk-Hai, and Oliphants beneath him... so numerous that they seem a carpet of filth on the great plain. He hefts his greatsword and throws it.
Six seconds later, the plains are filled with corpses.
Every. Single Opponent. Dead. Including the Oliphants and the siege weapons.
This is even starting to approach the offensive capabilities (not defensive or utility, of course) of a God Wizard, because he is effectively using an area-effect no-save-just-die that does not allow SR, and is not considered to be a Death effect. How? He's simply doing enough damage to one-hit kill his opponents.
This also negates one of the biggest disadvantages melee traditionally has: 'how can you reach me'. Simple... I throw my sword at you.
It still doesn't approach the defensive or utility capabilities of a Wizard, by any means. However, a strong offense can be a good defense. If there is no one left to harm you... then you remain unharmed. It's not perfect, of course. A knife in the dark (although with Improved Uncanny Dodge, it will have to be a good deal more involved than THAT), or spells launched from outside of Line of Sight (perhaps using scrying to target).
But really...
Area: Line of Sight (no risking friendly fire)
Effect: 'Die now'.
Uses: Unlimited.
Yea... it's kinda like that.
Let's look at two builds. One of which is the 'Practical' version, the other is the 'Way Out There' version.
Practical Whirlblades of Death.
Human WhirlPounceBarbarian1/Warblade4/Bloodstorm Blade4. That's right, this is a level 9 character.
Feats:
Power Attack (1st), Leap Attack (Human Bonus), Improved Bull Rush (3rd), Point Blank Shot (Bonus Warblade5 feat), Shock Trooper(6th), Cleave (Bloodstorm Blade3 bonus feat), Great Cleave (9th).
No flaws. No fuss. No muss.
For this exercise, he will be using a +1 Valorious Ghost Touch Greatsword.
His other 'magic item' for this exercise will be having Enlarge Person cast an permancied upon him.
Now, this gentleman does have a somewhat limited range. He can throw out to 5 range increments, or 50'. That still out-ranges Warlocks, and he can strike any opponent within this range.
So, he charges an opponent. Doesn't really matter which one. The important thing is the charge. This activates Shock Trooper, and allows him to transfer the entirety of his BAB (+9) as an AC penalty, for damage boosting. He's dealing 4x this damage (2x because it is a two-handed weapon, then another 1x from Leap Attack, and another 1x from Valorous weapon enhancement) for a bonus of 36, just from power attacking.
By level 9, he will have +2 stat bonus from levels (one at 4, and the other at 8). So his Strength is 20. With a Girdle of Giant Strength +2 (all he could afford with his other two purchases), he's got a Strength of 22. That means an additional +9 damage from Str bonus.
He is also getting +9 damage from Leading the Charge stance, because he is charging.
This brings his bonus damage up to +54. +1 from the enhancement bonus makes a nice +55 damage.
Base weapon damage on a Large Greatsword is 3d6, for an average of another 10 damage. So he's doing, on average, 65 damage a hit. Pretty weak, for a melee build at this level actually. I'm sure other optimizers can significantly boost damage output.
More than enough to auto-kill 'mooks', but it might not be enough for larger enemies, which will require multiple hits to kill. Still, even so, he can hit any opponent within 50', and if anything drops, he gets a free attack. So he's still cutting quite the swath through opponents. He's also got three attacks (one from Whirling Frenzy, and his two normal attacks from having a BAB of +9).
This is the 'practically optimized' version which is more suitable for normal play. However, this may still be too powerful for some tables. As always, double check with your GM, and make sure you are not stealing anyone else's thunder.
Whole hog version to follow, or I can let one of the other optimizers build him. In short, he uses Dragonwrought Kobold to get early access to Epic feats. He also uses Blood In The Water and a Keen Valorous Ghost Touch Aptitude Falchion.