Looking for Idea's for a Bad guy sneaking/heavy armour build

[Arc_knight25]

I've had this hankering to play an evil character that would wear heavy armour but also be able to be sneaky such as hide/move silently/tumble. No one would expect a brute in heavy armour to be able to be sneaking and tumbling in combat.

All is up for grabs here: Race, classes, feats.

My only restricts i would have is No 3rd party publishing.

please discuss.

[Pesimismrocks]

This seems a very difficult build to make.

I would suggest Binder/Spellthief or Rogue or if starting at a high level pure binder. Have the Sanvok vestige and the assasin based vestige (I forget the name). Just summon the armpur when your not sneaking around.
Otherwise the only way you could do it is to take the appropriate feats and you'd take large penalties.

[Urpriest]

There are a couple ways to do this.

5 levels in Ruby Knight Vindicator (Tome of Battle) let you ignore ACP to Hide, though not to Move Silently. But if you're a Cleric, you can cast Silence or the like to help with that.

Shadowbane Inquisitor gives a bonus to Hide and Move Silently when you expend a spell slot. It keeps all its abilities when fallen and goes great with Blackguard.

I wouldn't advise combining the two, but either works well for a heavily armored sneaky evil character.

[zlefin]

as long as the armor is masterwork mithril; the armor check penalty shouldn't be too bad. Add in Nimbleness from MIC and there's no armor check penalty on full plate.

[gorfnab]

Dread Commando prestige class (Heroes of Battle) + Ghost Faced Killer prestige class (Complete Adventurer)

[Karnith]

As far as equipment goes, a set of Mithral Full Plate (or whatever armor you want to use) with the shadow and/or silent moves enhancements would probably be a good idea.

[Arc_knight25]

I looked into the Binder build, its interesting, but I prefer to be more martial in my approach.

The Ruby Knight Vindicator seems interesting. I can see the benefits of having Cleric levels for spell casting may they be fore buffs or utility. But that would mean I would have to take levels in Crusader to get into the prestige class, without a feat. Then having to level as a Paladin or Cleric to get the turn ability.

As for the Shadowbane Inquisitor to Blackguard. Seems like alot of RPing to do the whole fall from grace thing. I'd prefer to already be fallen.

The Dread Commando looks solid. I would only take the 4 levels of it though. And pre reqs to get in are only BAB 5, Dodge, Mobility and 6 ranks in Move Silently and Hide.

Ghost-faced Killer seems like a one trick pony. Go inivis and stab. I prefer to annoy my opponents with mobility and a High AC.

I get that there is gear to decrease the ACP of armour and to give it bonuses. But if you can get the decrease to ACP from a class feature then I don't see why you wouldn't buy different quality's and enchantments for your gear.

Another Class to think of is the Vengeance Knight from Champions of Ruin(Forgotten Realms)

[Greenish]

The Ruby Knight Vindicator seems interesting. I can see the benefits of having Cleric levels for spell casting may they be fore buffs or utility. But that would mean I would have to take levels in Crusader to get into the prestige class, without a feat.I would consider that as a bonus.


Anyway, Iron Silence (CAdv.) is just a 2nd level spell that removes ACP from Hide/Move Silently for hour/level. That's not a major obstacle. Able Learner (RoD) or Guerilla Warrior (HoB) with a dip to a right class gets them as your class skills. Dwarf or Tooth of Savnok (ToM) allows you to Tumble in heavy armour.

[Urpriest]

I get that there is gear to decrease the ACP of armour and to give it bonuses. But if you can get the decrease to ACP from a class feature then I don't see why you wouldn't buy different quality's and enchantments for your gear.


You've got it strictly backwards. Levels are rarer than gold.

[Seharvepernfan]

You can't tumble if your speed has been reduced by armor, which means that only dwarves can tumble in heavy armor.

The blackguard prestige class is all about sneaky guys in heavy armor (though it's an unoptimized class). A dwarf blackguard who is surprisingly sneaky and slippery (and evil, for that matter) would be pretty cool.

As mentioned, shadow and silent moves enhancements, iron silence spell, or just silence and invisibility. You know, a duergar blackguard fits this role pretty well.

[Arc_knight25]

I did not know about not being able to tumble when your armour decreases movement. So Dwarf seems like the race I would need to be.

I can understand and appreciate spending money on gear to lower ACP. But I would rather (mostly for flavour) See those decreases come in the form of Class features so I can spend that money on other more hardy enchantments and the like. (most of my campaigns the DM is a touch stingy on the giving of Loot. I am sorry if any of my DMs see this post. All Hail the DM, Creator and Destroyer of worlds.)

Blackguard can be quit fun, just the need to have those good stat lines to make the most of the build. (ie. Blackguards benefit from a good charisma, yet I would rather have that as a dump stat and increase my Int for skills)

This Tooth of Savnok seems like a pain to be RPing with. I'd rather work of my own volition as opposed to that of Savnok.

So to recap

Race- Dwarf
Classes-I would so far consider Fighter or Crusader to start. Dip into Rogue levels to get the Skills and evasion for Prestige classes.

I would say if I had a Good stat line that consisted of many pluses I would have to say Crusader would be the way to go. For a weaker Stat line Fighter would be the safer route. But what I am looking to create relies Heavily on a good Str, Dex, Int, and a decent Con. Wis and Cha will have to be my lowest stats.

Prestige's I find appealing are Vengeance Knight, Dread Commando.

The Vengeance Knight also applies to shields as well as armour. So Sword and Board build to increase AC

[Daftendirekt]

Dread Commando prestige class

First thing that came to mind for me as well. Once made one of those for a one-shot - water orc in mithral full plate sneaking at no penalties thanks to that PrC.

[Doorhandle]

You are much better off in pathfinder, although such an armour will still take a chunk out of W.B.L

Take the shadow (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/magic-items/magic-armor/magic-armor-and-shield-special-abilities/shadow), improved shadow, (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/magic-items/magic-armor/magic-armor-and-shield-special-abilities/shadow-improved) or greater shadow (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/magic-items/magic-armor/magic-armor-and-shield-special-abilities/shadow-greater) quality to get a nice a bonus to stealth checks.
Take the creeping (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/magic-items/magic-armor/magic-armor-and-shield-special-abilities/creeping)armour quality so that the A.C.P doesn't apply to stealth checks, and gives you an untyped bonus.

Result: The Dark lord Sauron in full-plate regalia can outsneak the rouge. :smallcool:

[One Step Two]

Okay, try this on for size.

Your Base gear includes:

Masterwork Mithral Battle Plate (Races of Stone)
+9 AC, +3 Dex, ACP -3

Masterwork Mithral Extreme Shield (Races of Stone)
+ 3 AC, No Dex Max, ACP 0

The character is a Dwarf, with some brand of Evil.

UA Quick Trait (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/variant/buildingCharacters/characterTraits.htm#quick)

And your first 6 levels should look like this:

1st: Lunar Rogue* 1: Dwarven Armor Proficency
2nd: Fighter 1: Iron will Swap Tower Shield Proficency for ESP (Extreme Shield), Bonus feat. (I always like Improved initative)
3rd: Fighter 2: Weapon Focus (Shortsword), Iron Will
4th: Lunar Rogue* 2: Raging Rogue (replaces Evasion)
5th: Ranger 1: Track, Favoured Enemy, Wild Empathy
6th: Lunar Rogue* 3: Exotic Shield Prof Turtle Dart

*Lunar Rogue is from Dragon Magazine 340, replace evasion with rage for an even scarier Battle monster.
If you don't use Dragon Magazine Content, you can replace evasion with Spell Reflection in complete mage, as you will never get to use Evasion in heavy armour. Spell Reflection also meshes well with Vengeance Knight's Arcane Backlash.

Quick Trait, lose 1 HP per level to get +10ft movement, congrats, your Dwarf can move 30 in Battle Plate, and still tumble.
Rogue gives you a plethora of skills to qualify for Vengance Knight, and I also recommend taking Avenging Executioner from Complete Scoundrel for more sneak attack dice, put those sneak skills to work for Damage.
Ranger gives you track, which is handy, preferred enemy vs whatever your party uses for pure mean-ness.
Turtle Dart means you do not provoke AoO when moving from an oppoent you've hit with a Short sword, making the character wholly more agile.

At 20th, you'll be Rogue 3/Fighter 2/Ranger 1/Vengeance Knight 10/Avenging Executioner 4.

Grab the Craven feat for more damage while Sneak Attacking, and fill out whatever else you like. Enjoy :D

Edited for errors.

*Stealhy and it's Ilk are usually regarded as less-optimal, but when making contested rolls an untyped +2 to a skill is handy.

[Greenish]

1st: Lunar Rogue* 1: Dwarven Armor Proficency
2nd: Fighter 1: Iron Will
3rd: Fighter 2: Weapon Focus (Shortsword)
4th: Lunar Rogue* 2: Raging Rogue (replaces Evasion)
5th: Ranger 1: Turtle Dart
6th: Lunar Rogue* 3: Exotic Shield Proficency (Extreme Shield)Fighter can trade Tower Shield proficiency for Exotic Shield Proficiency of their choice, so that frees up a feat, which you might use for Iron Will (since it's not a fighter bonus feat).

[One Step Two]

Fighter can trade Tower Shield proficiency for Exotic Shield Proficiency of their choice, so that frees up a feat, which you might use for Iron Will (since it's not a fighter bonus feat).

Ah, thanks for pointing that out!

[karkus]

Some sort of magic item that activates a Silence spell on command.

[Arc_knight25]

A few things.

For Lunar Rogue doesn't Raging Rogue replace uncanny dodge?

Also when raging, the character wouldn't really be using his tumbling and tactics to most benifit his party. So I fail to see why rage once per day would be better then uncanny dodge. Even if it was able to replace Evasion, Rage once per day v.s evasion seems like a poor trade off.

(Also I'm not a big fan of Dragon Magizine.)

As for Spell Reflection it does seem to mesh well with the vengeance knight.
I would possibley work my way to get the feat Shieldward(add shield bonus to Touch AC) feat to get the most out of Spell Reflection.

The Quick trait seems worth it for the mobility. Turtle seems interesting as well. May avoid it to use a different feat.

I might take the Ranger level out and put in a level of Barbarian for the increased HP, Rage(to be used as a last ditch effort if things are looking bad) and increase my movement again by 10ft. So since the Battleplate would go down to Medium armour I would still get the increase of 10ft movement. I would be sacrificing 2 skill points, a +2 to reflex, wild empathy and Favoured Enemy. But if i'm forfeting my Evasion for Spell Reflection it shouldn't be too big a deal.

Casting silence on yourself can be dangerous since you won't be hearing anything either.

[One Step Two]

I double checked it, yes it replaced Uncanny Dodge, making Lunar Rogue non-applicable, go for the Spell Reflection. There's a magical enhancement for armor, Ghostward I think, a +1 ability from Magic item compendium that adds your enhancement bonus to AC to Touch AC, if you really want to push the save nice and high.

[Afool]

May I suggest the Giant's Fighter Feats (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=172910)? It's the 14th post down and they include armor focus feats that reduce ACP and increase base armor bonus.

[Arc_knight25]

I think I have gotten my desired build up to level 12.

Race-Dwarf
Levels:
1- Warblade - Feat: Guerrila warrior (HoB)
2- Warblade
3- Warblade - Feat: Dodge
4- Warblade
5- Warblade - Bonus Feat: White Raven Defense
6- Rogue - Feat: Mobility (Use Posion, instead of Trapfinding)
7- Rogue - (Spell reflection instead of Evasion)
8- Barbarian - Fast Movement (Whirling Frenzy instead of Rage)
9- Dread Commando - Feat: (Skill knowledge Tumble?)
10- Dread Commando
11- Dread Commando
12- Dread Comando -Feat: Dwarven Armour proficency?


This is what I have thus far. Need help with those last 2 feat not sure if either is worth it. I was hoping I could avoid the Mithril Heavy armour but it looks like I need that if I want the fast movement and the ability to tumble 15ft.

Now I chose the Skill Knowledge feat so I could continue to put skill ranks into tumble since it would be about 5 levels till i could continue to do so if i progress my Warblade.

And Dwarven Armour Proficency may not be worth the +1 AC that I get from Battle plate. Maybe Heavy Armour specialization would be better since it would +1 ac and -2 ACP.

Any ideas on how to finish this progression thus far?

[Ardantis]

Make that Barbarian dip a Lion Totem Barbarian (Complete Divine, I think, or Complete Champion) for Pounce. It'd seriously improve the build to full-attack on a charge, especially with only -10 to hide/move silently on charges.

[Callin]

Make that Barbarian dip a Lion Totem Barbarian (Complete Divine, I think, or Complete Champion) for Pounce. It'd seriously improve the build to full-attack on a charge, especially with only -10 to hide/move silently on charges.

Seconded

Ajsjdjdh

[Karnith]

Make that Barbarian dip a Lion Totem Barbarian (Complete Divine, I think, or Complete Champion) for Pounce.
Just to clarify, the Spirit Lion Totem barbarian ACF is in Complete Champion and grants pounce (in exchange for fast movement), and is distinct from the Lion Totem barbarian ACF in the SRD.

[Seharvepernfan]

Dread Commandos don't have tumble? Tumble focus is not worth a feat. I really don't see why you even need tumble, honestly, since you're so heavily armored and have mobility to boot, in addition to being a tough dwarf type.

Between those last two options, go with heavy armor specialization.

Do you need dodge and mobility?

I know you're going for the sneaky+heavy aspects, but you're really missing out on some good fighting abilities by choosing these various feats. Feats are precious, spend them on treasures, not knick-knacks.

[Arc_knight25]

Dodge and Mobility are to get into Dread Commando. And not Tumble Focus. It's a general feat In unearthed arcance to take a cross class skill and treat it like a class skill for all your classes.

Pounce would be great. I really want that fast movement though, so that I can tumble 15ft as opposed to 10ft. That 5ft makes a big difference when dealing with opponents that have reach and getting into position for flanking.

So I could take pounce for that Dip into Barbarian. Any other ways to get Fast movement? or a base speed increase.

Only other class I know that gets fast movement is Scout and thats after 3 lvls. Monks are out of the question since i'll be in heavy armour. And the dash feat is only a 5ft increase which doesn't change tumble.

And taking another dip into a class is killer at this point. If it can't be done then I'll just pass on pounce. Replacing rogue levels with Scout levels is a possibility. That would mean I would need to take 5 lvls of scout to get Evasion so I could replace it with Spell reflection.

And just as an aside: I will be using most of the White Raven Dicipline. Mixes well with the Dread Commando for flavour as well as the Warblade for trying to make the best strike team.

[Seharvepernfan]

The fast movement from barbarian and scout cannot be used in heavy armor. Maybe get some boots of striding and springing or something like that.

[laeZ1]

You can't tumble if your speed has been reduced by armor, which means that only dwarves can tumble in heavy armor.

The blackguard prestige class is all about sneaky guys in heavy armor (though it's an unoptimized class). A dwarf blackguard who is surprisingly sneaky and slippery (and evil, for that matter) would be pretty cool.

As mentioned, shadow and silent moves enhancements, iron silence spell, or just silence and invisibility. You know, a duergar blackguard fits this role pretty well.

This is exactly what I was going to suggest.

[Arc_knight25]

A dwarf can tumble in Heavy armour because his Movement speed isn't reduced by the armour. Fast movement doesn't work in heavy armour. But if that Heavy Armour was made of mithril then it becomes Medium and Fast movement then again works.

Boots of Springing and Striding seem to be the easiest way to get to that 30ft of movement i'm looking for.

So its looking like I will need to take the Dwarven Armour proficency to be able to wear the Battleplate. Since none of the other classes thus far have given me Heavy armour proficency, Which i need to use Heavy armour even if they are made of Mithril. Or at least I'm sure its what any decent DM would decree.

And besides I'll get used to the 10ft Tumble in those early levels anyways.

So to recap:
I will be taking Pounce instead of Fast Movement.

Gear I will be looking to get is Mithril Battleplate around lvl 12 or so. And Boots of Springing and Striding whenever I can afford them.

Still looking for away to continue my build from lvl 13 on? I may just stick with the Warblade till 20. if there is any more ideas out there please share.

[Fouredged Sword]

Swordsage could be interesting as you can add shadow hand to your bag of tricks. You can get a stance that adds concealment if you move 10ft each round, allowing you to sneak through open areas so long as you keep moving. This makes a cool ninja effect as your character suddenly appears after you stop moving.

Scout would still be a good idea. You get skirmish and that adds to your AC when you keep moving each round. Improve Skirmish bumps that up to useful levels if you can pull off 20ft of movement a round.

Ranger could also be useful, especially when applied after 3 levels of scout to allow for swift tracker to stack the two for skirmish and allow skirmish damage to favored enemies despite immunity. You could pick elementals, undead, and maybe arcanists as your foes, allowing you to bypass crit immunity of anything with SLA's as far as skirmish is concerned.

[Arc_knight25]

I did notice the Shadow discipline that the Swordsage has, but the hit to BAB and lack of armour prof and bonus feats that the Warblade gives i don't think is worth the switch. I'm not looking for all the readied maneuvers that the Swordsage gives. Flavour wise as well the Warblade seems like a better choice then the Swordsage would.

As for the Scout levels. They are a little less up in the air. The ability to charge and use pounce while moving silently and hiding seems solid since I would not only get my Sneak attack off from those rogue levels but also the sudden strike dmg from the Dread Commando.

Also as I was reading the MIC Mithral Fullplate counts as Medium armour for movement, proficiency and other limitations. So Dwarven Armour is now out as a feat.

[Fouredged Sword]

I was suggesting the swordsage as a 1-4 level dip in the build. You will have the initiator level to cherry pick shadow hand abilities you like without being stuck with low level strikes to fill in space.

You already have armor prof, and the 3/4th bab is mitigated by the fact that you get free weapon focus, rounding out that -1 to 0.


Nobody expects the heavy armor guy to whip out a setting sun countercharge or a shadowhand SU port.

Just a thought. I think you will find it gives more than more warblade levels at this point in your build.

[Arc_knight25]

So just to make sure I follow. If I were to take Warblade at lvl 13. My initiator lvl would be 6(warblade)+1(2 rogue lvls)+0(Need 2 Barbarian lvls to benift from the 1/2 lvl?)+4(Dread Commando) so a total of 11?

Which would mean I could select up to level 6 manuevers?

If that is the case the 4 lvl dip into Swordsage would be worth it. Making my first lvl of Swordsage at lvl 14 would allow me to have up to 5th lvl maneuvers.

I just worry about taking to many classes. I personally dislike going over 3 classes with my characters. And at the moment I am at 4 classes before taking Swordsage.

I must say the Tome of Battle classes are quite powerful. Just from the single fact that you can still continue advancing your manuever levels even when multiclassing.

[Fouredged Sword]

Not quite. You get half of all non-swordsage levels added to your swordsage level when determining your initiator level.

At level 13 you get 13/2 = 6 as your base initiator level for swordsage, plus one for the first level of swordsage. This gets you fourth level maneuvers/stances if I am not mistaken. You can get 8th level starting initiator level by dipping another class to round yourself up to 14/2=7 before starting swordsage though.

Then you can go into a initiator advancing PRC, advancing both warblade and swordsage initiator levels one per level, and adding maneuvers and stances to ether class's set of prepared/known list.

In fact, I think you should consider the unarmed swordsage alternative and then go into the master of nine PRC. That would allow you to port shadowhand stuff to your warblade prep method, really allowing you to jump around combat with porting. It would also allow you to prep just about every warblade strike you care about all at once.

Something like
Build / rogue 1 (extra 1d6 sneak attack) / unarmed swordsage 2 / Master of Nine 5

The standard master of nine entry is a warblade / swordsage multiclass, so that ties your class set up better into a cohesive package despite the number of classes.

[Arc_knight25]

I thought that since Dread Commando was a prestige class it was full initiator lvl. But it is only for Martial discipline prestige classes that give the full initiator lvl.

This does sound viable, but to me it just feels like its getting away from what I want the character to be.

I'll do a recap of level by level of what I'm thinking again when I get home tonight.

[Callin]

page 39 in the Multiclass Section

Prestige Classes work a little differently. In most cases, you add the full prestige class level to your initiator level. See the prestige class sections in Chapter 5 for more details

Looking through chapter 5 there is nothing more about prestige classes other than those in the book.

[Fouredged Sword]

I think the issue is that by level 13 you have a strong base of your character concept already fleshed out. You are a guy in heavy armor who sneaks around.

Past that you get to develope is a direction of your choice.

Another idea would be build / trapsmith 1 / swiftblade 6. This would give you self cast haste and bonuses to your abilities when hasted (including increased move speed not dependent on armor)

This is more about the speed aspect of your character.

[Arc_knight25]

I would like to aim to stay within 4 classes. So Warblade and Dread Commando are staying for sure. I liked the Pounce ability from the Barbarian. I may just switch Rogue for Scout. And just take more levels in Scout at those later levels to improve Skirmish. I'll be tumbling around all the while.

It is quite hard to come to terms with a definate progression for this build since there is so many ways to achieve it.