Swordsage Character help

[Stryke]

OK, the theme of this character is a teleporting death dealer that can turn around and go toe-to-toe with a choose target, preferably a two weapon fighter.

My plan is to go a DEX based swordsage using shadowhand, but i'm unsure on how to get the one-on-one aspect how to go about building the character.
TWF, the plan is to eventually have a double bladed sword and two punching daggers.

aiming to start with a level 4 character, so far i have
Ability scores are, 18 16 16 15 13 13,
going to distribute them as, DEX, CON, WIS, STR, INT, CHAR

Human: Adaptive Style
Flaws: Two weapon fighting (unsure what flaw to take)
1. Shadow Blade, WF(Punching Dagger)
2.
3. Weapons Finesse
4. Disiplie focus( Shadow hand? )
5.
6. Exotic weapons proficency (two bladed sword)
7.
8.
9. Gloom Razor

I'll be taking shadow hand primarily and i havent decided how i want to do my 1-on-1 so i would appreciate some input on what to take in regards to more or less everything here its my first ToB character so i'm open to all suggestions.

Any advice on skills (hide for gloom razor obviously), equpiment and anything else you can think of would be greatly appreciated

[Dusk Eclipse]

Punching Dagger and Two-bladed sword don't work with Shadow Blade, it only affects shadow hand weapons (Daggers, spiked chain, unarmed attack, sai and siangam) so my recommendation is going dual daggers all the way.

If you are so inclined you could also dip Blood Claw master for two levels and get full str and dex to damage with daggers.

[Stryke]

the plan was to take another disipline and use the TBSword with that, but i'll swap in the daggers, also can you tell me where in the book iot says that i cant find it :s

[Lonely Tylenol]

My advice?

Don't bother with Weapon Focus if you can avoid it; specifically, the Swordsage gets weapon focus with a weapon from a preferred school at level 1. I'm away from books, but if punching dagger isn't a Shadow Hand preferred weapon, ask if your DM will make it so. (Correction: I just realized that you have done precisely this, and that your Human feat is listed separately. My bad.)

Since you have uniformly high attributes (and aren't dumping STR outright), one thing you might do is build for both STR and DEX, somewhat. After all, Shadow Blade adds your DEX to damage while in a Shadow Hand stance--but it doesn't remove STR to damage. With your current array, adding your fourth-level attribute point into STR would give you STR and DEX scores of 16 and 18, respectively, which would add 7 to damage (and can be improved upon in the future)! Similarly, Weapon Finesse becomes superfluous at low levels; after all, the difference in your to-hit between STR and DEX will only be 1; which isn't worth spending a feat on (if you can swing something better in at low levels, of course). If you continue to build DEX to the exclusion of STR, then Weapon Finesse becomes more necessary later, but at this point it just isn't so.

As far as your first discipline focus, I would recommend Diamond Mind in place of Shadow Hand. By all means, continue to use the Shadow Hand stuff for the "teleporting" half of your "teleporting instrument of death" build; it is unique in its capacity to do that part and do that well. That said, a majority of the Shadow Hand style's better tricks don't deal damage, and the ones that do are generally pretty underwhelming. I'm not sure how some of Diamond Mind's damaging maneuvers interact with Discipline Focus, but at any rate, they are likely to be your flagship maneuver set for the "instrument of death" half of your "teleporting instrument of death" build.

I'm sure somebody else with book access will improve upon this model significantly.

Good luck!

[Dusk Eclipse]

It seems you are making a rookie mistake, other than certain feats (like Shadow Blade for example) and some class abilities, the disciplines weapons are purely fluff, you don't have to use an specific weapon for each maneuver. You can use any weapon with any maneuver.

The reason I suggested daggers is because the full str when dual wielding and reduction in attack penalties of Bloodclaw Master only work with Tiger Claw weapons, Shadow Blade only work with Shadow Hand weapons, and daggers are the only weapon that fit both criteria.

For the record the Discipline weapons are detailed in page 41-42.

[limejuicepowder]

Well I'm not really sure what to do with TWF, but I would recommend this build (a bit of a change from sworsage 4):

swordsage 3 fighter 1 swordsage 2 fighter 1 swordsage X

1st: shadow blade, adaptive style, flaw: combat expertise, deadly defense

3rd: exotic weapon proficiency: broadblade shortsword*

4th (fighter): dodge

6th: mobility

7th (fighter): einhander

9th: elusive target

Combat expertise should be used all of the time at -2. This will reduce your attack roll by 2 but increase your defense by 5 (2 normal, +1 for the broadblade shortsword and +2 for einhander) - this would mean your AC is 22 without wearing any armor at all. Deadly defense will increase your damage by 1d6. Einhander and Elusive target also give you some other nifty options when fighting crowds OR single opponents, especially Negate Power Attack, Cause Overreach, and Off-hand Swap. Plus, you'll still have the bevy of combat options your maneuvers give you.

*note: if your DM is a stickler, he might say "broadblade shortsword" isn't a "shortsword," and thus doesn't work with shadow blade. That will hurt this build, but won't kill it - you'll lose dex to damage and the free weapon focus, but free up a feat.

[only1doug]

Human: Adaptive Style
1. Shadow Blade, Discipline Focus: Shadow Hand (Weapon Focus for all Shadow Hand weapons)
2.
3. L3 feat
4. Discipline Focus: Shadow Hand (insightful strike, +Wisdom mod to all Shadow Hand strike damage rolls)
5.
6. L6 Feat
7.
8. Discipline Focus: Shadow Hand (defensive Stance)
9. L9 Feat

Insightful strike comparison

Shadow hand strikes vs Diamond Mind Strikes

Level by Level breakdown
L1 advantage SH
DM: Sapphire Nightmare Blade
SH: Clinging shadow strike, Shadow Blade Technique

L2 draw
DM: Emerald Razor- touch attack
SH: Drain Vitality- con damage

L3 advantage SH
DM: Insightful strike- damage = concentration check
SH: Shadow Garrote- ranged touch
SH: Strength Draining Strike- str damage

L4 draw
DM: Bounding Assault- double move then attack
DM: Ruby Nightmare Blade- 2x damage on Conc check
SH: Hand of Death- Paralyses
SH: Obscuring Shadow Veil- miss chance + big damage

L5 advantage Diamond Mind
DM: Disrupting Blow-
SH: no strikes

L6 advantage SH
DM: Greater Insightful strike- damage = 2x concentration check
SH: Ghost Blade- target becomes flat footed
SH: Shadow Noose- ranged touch, big damage
SH: Stalker in the night- move and attack while hidden

L7 advantage DM
DM: Avalanch of Blades
SH: Death in the Dark

L8 advantage SH
DM: Diamond Nightmare blade
SH: Enervating shadow strike

L9 advantage DM
DM: Time stands still
SH: 5 shadow stupidly long name strike

Overview

Overall I think that Shadow hand gains more benefit from insightful strike as it focuses on low damage + effect so additional damage is useful, with the higher damage strikes of Diamond Mind the additional bonus damage from wisdom becomes less important.
with L7 and L9 maneuvers Diamond Mind gains more advantage as it uses multiple base damage strikes so the benefit of insightful strike is multiplied.
I'd pick Shadow hand for L4 as you can pick a second insightful strike at L12

Defensive Stance Comparison:

at lower levels Shadow Hand Stances are just better for the character you are describing, some of the higher level Diamond Mind stances start to compete later.

Two Weapon Fighting:

ToB classes don't make great TWFs IMO as Manuevers generally require a standard action initiation and this precludes TWF (which needs a full attack action). At higher Levels the Diamond Mind Manuever Time Stands Still offers a benefit to a TWF but that is about it.
So your choice becomes should you TWF or should you use a maneuver, which means you have optimised to do two seperate things in the same situation.

If I were GMing for this character I would suggest that flavor wise I see no problem with describing your character as weilding two daggers and using them in your strikes in a TWF style, but there is no actual game benefit from the 2nd weapon so I would not enforce a penalty due to lack of TWF feats.

See below

[limejuicepowder]

Two Weapon Fighting:

ToB classes don't make great TWFs IMO as Manuevers generally require a standard action initiation and this precludes TWF (which needs a full attack action). At higher Levels the Diamond Mind Manuever Time Stands Still offers a benefit to a TWF but that is about it.
So your choice becomes should you TWF or should you use a maneuver, which means you have optimised to do two seperate things in the same situation.

If I were GMing for this character I would suggest that flavor wise I see no problem with describing your character as weilding two daggers and using them in your strikes in a TWF style, but there is no actual game benefit from the 2nd weapon so I would not enforce a penalty due to lack of TWF feats.

Um, what about tiger claw? It has multiple maneuvers, starting at level 1, that strike with both weapons. I would actually call it the only way to TWF without sneak attack. So I guess I completely disagree with you.

[Kelb_Panthera]

For what you're doing, I'd suggest shadow hand for stances, diamond mind for strikes, and; most importantly; tiger claw for boosts.

Tigerclaw has all the good TWF boosts, and both of the good twf strikes. Wolf fang strike lets you use both weapons after a move, pouncing charge does exactly what it says on the tin, dancing and raging mongoose both give extra attacks in a full attack but require TWF to reach their full potential, and girralon windmill flesh rip loves TWF.

Shadow hand has assassins stance, which is great for multiple attacks; dance of the spider, which is great for sneaking; and of course, shadow jaunt, stride, and blink, which are paramount to your MO.

Finally, Diamond mind has the emrald razor and gem nightmare strikes, all of which make hitting hard when you can't stand still possible, and time stands still, the single best maneuver for TWF's in the book. You might also consider a setting sun counter or two, since they're great for stealing some of the typical bruiser's thunder.


On classes: Bloodclaw master is your friend. A pair of daggers in the hands of a bloodclaw master with shadow blade and discipline focus in tigerclaw using pouncing charge is going to hurt especially if he's got dancing or raging mongoose or girralon windmill flesh rip up too. Can you say splat?

Don't pick up all three TWF feats. Get TWF, buy gloves of the balanced hand, and forget that GTWF even exists.

[only1doug]

Um, what about tiger claw? It has multiple maneuvers, starting at level 1, that strike with both weapons. I would actually call it the only way to TWF without sneak attack. So I guess I completely disagree with you.


Ah you see, I don't normally focus on TWF builds, so I completely forgot about Tiger Claw style, So my response was based on the Diamond Mind / Shadow Hand Trade off.

Let me try again:

Human: Adaptive Style
1. Shadow Blade, Discipline Focus: Tiger Claw or Shadow Hand (Weapon Focus for all weapons in discipline)
2.
3. L3 feat
4. Discipline Focus: Tiger Caw (insightful strike, +Wisdom mod to all Tiger Claw strike damage rolls)
5.
6. L6 Feat
7.
8. Discipline Focus: Shadow Hand or Tiger Claw (Defensive Stance)
9. L9 Feat

Tiger Claw Weapons: Kukri, Kama, Handaxe, Claw, Greataxe, Unarmed Strike
Shadow Hand Weapons: dagger, shortsword, sai, siangham, spiked chain, unarmed strike.

I still think that Shadow Hand has the edge when it comes to stances for the defensive stance discipline focus, but the OP should choose his stances and then decide which are most likely to benefit from +2 ac.

Skills
If taking Tiger Claw manuevers (which you should) then Jump is a useful skill.
If you are taking any Diamond Mind Manuevers then Concentration also becomes useful. (as in, deal dameg = to concentration check x4)
as you said already Hide skill.

[Gharkash]

Wanting to input what insight i have on this, as i am currently playing a swordsage.

For skills, Jump (Tiger Claw has some pretty awsome strikes, especialy at higher levels), Hide, Move Silently, Sense motive (usefull in general, pick Baffling Defense and evade those attacks), Listen, Concentration (Diamond Mind is damn good, and has ways to flat foot opponents at early levels for Assasin's Stance which is Shadow Hand, so Shadow Blade goes here) and Tumble to shift through the battlefield.

For focuses i would advice against Shadow Hand. The strikes in the discipline are not that good, aside from the 9th level one and Bloodletting Strike (the Con damage one, i hopefully remember the name well).

Both Tiger Claw and Diamond Mind are good focuses, and with Diamond Mind having maneuvers that double or quadrouple your damage that Wis modifier will go a long way.

If you are not that fixed on TWF (i personaly play a str based 2hander) may i suggest something i find interesting? Go strength 18, Wis/Dex 16. Unarmed Variant. Have some good Con. Pick Snap kick and Improved Unarmed Damage. Also go down the Shadow Blade route (notice that unarmed strikes are Shadow Hand and Tiger claw weapons, so if you really want to TWF you can do this with snap kick for standar action attacks and TWF for full round, but then you need 18 dex and finesse).

Shadow Jaunt line from Shadow hand, [x] Nighmare Blade line and Insightfull Strike line from Diamond Mind, Rabid Bear, Swooping Dragon, Pouncing Charge and the Mongoose line from Tiger Claw.

Make the character be buff as hell, you are now a huge monk that teleports around punching people hard and fast in the ground.

Bonus points if you get some Desert Wind boosts for fire punches, you have just evolved to Akuma.

[A_S]

If you can get your hands on Shadow Pounce (with Telflammar Shadowlord 4, from Unapproachable East, or Crinti Shadow Marauder 5, from Shining South), it's a way to make your "teleporting melee character" concept extremely effective (even if your DM is reasonable and doesn't let you use it to trigger multiple full attacks per round, which it's capable of by RAW).

Unfortunately, although Shadow Pounce works with the Swordsage's teleportation maneuvers, both the classes that grant it are hard to qualify for with Swordsage alone. Ask your DM if you can use the Swordsage's teleportation to satisfy Telflammar Shadowlord's Dimension Door prerequisite; if so, it's perfect for what you want to do.

If you do elect to go this route, you'll be focusing more on full attacks than on offensive maneuvers. Fortunately, Swordsages get tons of great maneuvers that aren't strikes (although you should still take a decent strike or three for those times when you just have to use your move action for something). With some Sneak Attack from both Assassin's Stance and Telflammar Shadowlord, and a focus on full attacking, TWF would be completely viable for this build.