Swiftblades

[Melcar]

So... A player wants to play this PrC... Is there anyone that could tell me if there is any cheese I should be aware of, and possible how to counter it?

It looks very powerful, but it all new knowledge to me, so im thinking that the collective hivemind of this community would know something! :smallsmile:

Thanks!

[Snowbluff]

Um... it's really strong. Cheese? Nothing in particular, unless you consider persisted swift/ocular haste cheese.

Counters? Nope. It's pretty much a gish that is designed not to be shut down by things most gish are hurt by. You can counterspell the haste with slow, but that's a bit like chopping off a fighter's arm. If he's going into the class, he's made an investment that weakened his casting for it. I am not sure why he shouldn't be able to make good on his investment.

[DarkSonic1337]

Occasionally throwing a slow at him is fine though, especially when fighting intelligent enemies who know the party's abilities for some reason (previous encounters, intel from minions, ect, ect). Even then, slow will stop working as a dispel when he gets to swiftblade 6 and his haste becomes an undispellable EX ability. After that only being unable to cast haste or counterspelling him will prevent him from getting haste up and keeping it up.

It's strongest option is it's 9th level ability, which gives you an extra standard action. Extra actions are always good, BUT you're also losing 3 caster levels for it. There are plenty of good gish builds that lose only 1-2 caster levels, though they often don't get abilities as cool as swiftblade's.

Don't allow persisted occular swift haste unless your group is okay with the power that comes with persisted stuff in general (this case isn't more powerful than persisted wraithstrike for instance). It is a hassle to do occular swifthaste though, as it is a RANGER spell. The swiftblade class features only work with a haste you've casted yourself, so you have to find a way to cast persisted occular swifthaste (pretty much involves putting swifthaste on your spell list).

A fun little trick I like to do with swfitblade is use heroics to grab bounding assault and rapid blitz...because pretty much nobody uses those feats lol.

[Snowbluff]

Slow doesn't dispel their Haste at a certain point. Thought I'd point it out.

Swift/Ocular. That's a slash. Swift or Ocular spell would accomplish the task for being persisted.

Spelldancer is a good dip for Swiftblade due to the matching prereqs. Wizard6/Swiftblade9/Spelldancer1/Abjurantchamp4 is the build.

[DarkSonic1337]

The spelldancer swiftblade is SUPER feat intensive though, and not more powerful than other persist builds (incantatrix builds, DMM persist builds, ect).

Mobility armor to ease the prereqs helps a bit.

[Rebel7284]

The main issue with swiftblade is that it totally overshadows a fighter.

Being so behind in casting makes them way weaker than dedicated casters though. Extra actions at swiftblade 9 are nice of course, but doesn't catch them up all the way.

[DarkSonic1337]

Every gish overshadows the fighter. That's just...magic :smallfrown:

[Zanos]

The main issue with swiftblade is that it totally overshadows a fighter.
There are more things that overshadow a fighter than there are things that don't.

[Snowbluff]

The spelldancer swiftblade is SUPER feat intensive though, and not more powerful than other persist builds (incantatrix builds, DMM persist builds, ect).

Mobility armor to ease the prereqs helps a bit.

... You didn't listen to what I said. SB, AbjC, and SD have similiar Prerequisites. Martial Wizard helps cover the feats. It all adds up. Incantatrix is strictly worse on a gish build, due to the limit of free persists and the requirement to pump more spellcraft than normally possible. Elf or Neraph makes the weapon prereqs a non issue. Tumble is a Swiftblade skill for Spelldancer entry. Etc, etc...


There are more things that overshadow a fighter than there are things that don't.
Yeah, fighter is awful. Warblade is free. Warblade is awesome. You should allow Warblade. (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=176968)

[Icewraith]

Note that swiftblade does in fact receive the Bounding Assault feat.

Well it might. One thing to be aware of is the swiftblade was updated a bunch of times last I checked, so there might be versions wandering aorund the internet with different BAB and lost caster levels. The "final" iteration that I am aware of is full BAB but loses 4 caster levels over ten levels. You either get 9th level spells (barely) or you get the interesting time Stop effect. Losing any other caster levels (for, say, a level of warblade) completely costs you 9th level spells.

[DarkSonic1337]

Yeah they get bounding assault at level 7. I still like using heroics to grab it a little earlier.

[Captnq]

What's a swiftblade and what book is it in?

[Kuulvheysoon]

It's an extreme haste specialist. And it wasn't published in any book, but online (http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/prc/20070327).

[Amphetryon]

The spelldancer swiftblade is SUPER feat intensive though, and not more powerful than other persist builds (incantatrix builds, DMM persist builds, ect).

Mobility armor to ease the prereqs helps a bit.

I'm not sure that "super Feat intensive" is a terrible indictment against a build that does exactly what you want. Could you explain why it's a problem that all your Feats go to making concept and Character match?

[jaybird]

What's a swiftblade and what book is it in?

It's Bullet Time (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/BulletTime) meets Magic Knight (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/MagicKnight).

[Eldariel]

I'm not sure that "super Feat intensive" is a terrible indictment against a build that does exactly what you want. Could you explain why it's a problem that all your Feats go to making concept and Character match?

Generally not having enough feats to actually do what you want. Like, if you finally get the basic functionality you want down on level 18 that's kinda late for most games.


Slow doesn't dispel their Haste at a certain point. Thought I'd point it out.

Even when you do have it dispelled, it's only a swift action to recast it for the encounter anyways. Not a big deal either way. It can be properly re-persisted later.

[Amphetryon]

Generally not having enough feats to actually do what you want. Like, if you finally get the basic functionality you want down on level 18 that's kinda late for most games.

But, if your overall build is exactly what you want - and the proposed one seems to fit that metric - then "Feat intensive" doesn't matter very much. The complaint against it seems to me to be similar to complaining about the large amount of working parts and labor that go into making a Lamborghini; if that's the "supercar" you want, don't complain that it takes a bit of time and effort to roll off the factory floor.

There's also the (apparently) false assumption built into the "Feat intensive" complaint that the build is non-functional before every Feat gets locked into place; that argument would clearly indicate that Wizard 1-6, and the entirety of the Swiftblade PrC, fails to function. I doubt any of us truly believe that.

[Snowbluff]

Even when you do have it dispelled, it's only a swift action to recast it for the encounter anyways. Not a big deal either way. It can be properly re-persisted later.

Oh! :o

I forgot. Swiftblade is better at persist, since the Ex haste can't be dispelled in anyway.

[Eldariel]

But, if your overall build is exactly what you want - and the proposed one seems to fit that metric - then "Feat intensive" doesn't matter very much. The complaint against it seems to me to be similar to complaining about the large amount of working parts and labor that go into making a Lamborghini; if that's the "supercar" you want, don't complain that it takes a bit of time and effort to roll off the factory floor.

Well, in my books it's only a problem if you can't actually do it; e.g. if you don't have enough feats to enter the PRCs on time or you miss out on something absolutely essential (say, Persistent Spell in a build that plans on Persisting Haste).

To use your example, it's all fine and good to put all your resources into Lamborghini but if you put all your resources into Lamborghini and are left with a car without suspensions, you're probably not too happy. The game doesn't have limitless resources and if you can't realize your concept with the resources you're given that's kind of a bummer (a common problem with PRCs that have pointlessly big feat tax to enter, such as Swiftblade).

[Zombulian]

Slow doesn't dispel their Haste at a certain point. Thought I'd point it out.

Swift/Ocular. That's a slash. Swift or Ocular spell would accomplish the task for being persisted.

Spelldancer is a good dip for Swiftblade due to the matching prereqs. Wizard6/Swiftblade9/Spelldancer1/Abjurantchamp4 is the build.

I'll be honest. I don't really understand how Swift Haste or adding the Ocular Spell feat makes Haste persisted. I feel like I'm missing something.

[DeltaEmil]

I'll be honest. I don't really understand how Swift Haste or adding the Ocular Spell feat makes Haste persisted. I feel like I'm missing something.Persistent spell only works on spells with a fixed or personal range.

Swift haste is a personal range spell. Occular spell transforms Haste, a non-personal spell, into a ray with a fixed range of 60 feet. This way, because swift haste is personal, and an occularized haste spell has a fixed range, you can now persist them.

[Zombulian]

Persistent spell only works on spells with a fixed or personal range.

Swift haste is a personal range spell. Occular spell transforms Haste, a non-personal spell, into a ray with a fixed range of 60 feet. This way, because swift haste is personal, and an occularized haste spell has a fixed range, you can now persist them.

Ohhhhhh. I was looking for some Swiftblade class ability that persisted haste if you cast it twice on yourself (2 eyes/regular haste + swift haste)... This makes more sense.

[DarkSonic1337]

I'm not sure that "super Feat intensive" is a terrible indictment against a build that does exactly what you want. Could you explain why it's a problem that all your Feats go to making concept and Character match?

Dodge, Mobility, Endurance, Combat Casting, Extend Spell, Persistent Spell.

That's 6 feats to get your build working the way you want it! 4 of which feel more like feat taxes than actually useful abilities. The fluff of the feats fit, but the feats themselves don't really synergize mechanically because the things they cover were already easily preventable. I at least go with Expeditous dodge most of the time, but some of my DMs aren't cool with mobility armor to meet prereqs Q_Q.

[Amphetryon]

Dodge, Mobility, Endurance, Combat Casting, Extend Spell, Persistent Spell.

That's 6 feats to get your build working the way you want it! 4 of which feel more like feat taxes than actually useful abilities. The fluff of the feats fit, but the feats themselves don't really synergize mechanically because the things they cover were already easily preventable. I at least go with Expeditous dodge most of the time, but some of my DMs aren't cool with mobility armor to meet prereqs Q_Q.

I know what the Feats are. I'm saying that using Feats to get the build to do what you want isn't a negative thing, to my mind.

[Phaederkiel]

in my opinion you should just watch it that your player gets in as a wizard, not as a cleric.
(haste is a domain spell for either time or travel, both excellent domains)

And you should watch it that he does not combine ToB into the swiftblade, as this tends to get really ugly.

My expertise with swiftblade comes only from using one as a BBEG, though.

[Karnith]

in my opinion you should just watch it that your player gets in as a wizard, not as a cleric.
Swiftblade doesn't normally progress Cleric casting, so that would probably not be the best choice for the player, yeah.

[Eldariel]

I know what the Feats are. I'm saying that using Feats to get the build to do what you want isn't a negative thing, to my mind.

Sure, but if you're a gish and don't have a feat left for Arcane Strike, that's gonna feel kinda bad. It's kinda like being a Druid and not having a feat for Natural Spell, minus being a class that could actually afford such a drop.

[Thrice Dead Cat]

To be fair, a martial wizard elf has dodge, mobility, endurance, combat casting, and extend spell by 6th level. Add just a single flaw, and arcane strike comes online at 9th level. IIRC, due to the BAB requirement, that's already as soon as possible.

[Amphetryon]

To be fair, a martial wizard elf has dodge, mobility, endurance, combat casting, and extend spell by 6th level. Add just a single flaw, and arcane strike comes online at 9th level. IIRC, due to the BAB requirement, that's already as soon as possible.

Apparently this is not "soon enough" for the detractors in this particular thread, who seem to find that long a wait to be a legitimate hardship to their fun.

[Eldariel]

To be fair, a martial wizard elf has dodge, mobility, endurance, combat casting, and extend spell by 6th level. Add just a single flaw, and arcane strike comes online at 9th level. IIRC, due to the BAB requirement, that's already as soon as possible.

Yeah, it's not that big of a problem if you're willing to give up Scribe Scroll & flaws are allowed. Now, try that as a normal Wizard fitting in Extend Spell, Persistent Spell and Spelldancer with no flaws.


Apparently this is not "soon enough" for the detractors in this particular thread, who seem to find that long a wait to be a legitimate hardship to their fun.

Playing ~50+ extra encounters without basic competence should be a legitimate complaint in my books. Like, if you start around level 3, every extra level you have to wait is pretty annoying, let alone if there's 10 of them.

[Amphetryon]

Playing ~50+ extra encounters without basic competence should be a legitimate complaint in my books. Like, if you start around level 3, every extra level you have to wait is pretty annoying, let alone if there's 10 of them.
So, Swiftblade is unacceptably gimped to you as written, for your playstyle and preferences. Fair enough.

I suspect that, by that metric, very little of 3.X falls into the parameters of "playable."

[Eldariel]

So, Swiftblade is unacceptably gimped to you as written, for your playstyle and preferences. Fair enough.

I suspect that, by that metric, very little of 3.X falls into the parameters of "playable."

Don't put words in my mouth. Did I ever say it's unacceptably gimped? Has anybody suggested that? I'm just saying it has an annoying feat tax and if you add Spelldancer, it has an incredibly large feat tax to the point where, if there are feats you're interested in, you really don't have the option of taking. Like, you'll probably be trundling around without Power Attack at that point.

You can play it but you'll notice you lack fundamentals so your melee damage, among other things, won't be all that (which is annoying as a gish since you are already gimping your casting to gain some melee prowess) unless you just Heroics all the feats or something (I, personally, prefer it when my character has basic competence on his person rather than relying on a spell for everything). It will detract from the play experience unless you go through a lot of hoops to get extra feats (or like Chaos Shuffle Elf Racial Proficiencies or something along those lines).

[Phaederkiel]

Swiftblade doesn't normally progress Cleric casting, so that would probably not be the best choice for the player, yeah.

gosh, you are right.
But i am quite sure i saw some way to go in as a cleric (with all the combat perks this entails). But it seems there was some high level of cheese involved, which makes it quite unlikely to happen.


and there was some way to get easily in via trapsmith, i think, but i do not remember exactly.

[Amphetryon]

Don't put words in my mouth. Did I ever say it's unacceptably gimped? Has anybody suggested that? I'm just saying it has an annoying feat tax and if you add Spelldancer, it has an incredibly large feat tax to the point where, if there are feats you're interested in, you really don't have the option of taking. Like, you'll probably be trundling around without Power Attack at that point.

You can play it but you'll notice you lack fundamentals so your melee damage, among other things, won't be all that (which is annoying as a gish since you are already gimping your casting to gain some melee prowess) unless you just Heroics all the feats or something (I, personally, prefer it when my character has basic competence on his person rather than relying on a spell for everything). It will detract from the play experience unless you go through a lot of hoops to get extra feats (or like Chaos Shuffle Elf Racial Proficiencies or something along those lines).

If I, as DM, had a Player complain that Swiftblade was too Feat intensive and use the "50+ encounters to get my stuff" argument, I could only conclude that the Player found the "Feat tax" too egregious, else why would the complaint have reached the level of mentioning it to the DM.

If I, as DM, had a Player complain with the exact 2nd paragraph that you wrote above, I could only conclude that the large list of caveats immediately after "but" are to be understood as "but I couldn't play it, as written."

In other words, any Player I've seen who voiced the complaints against Swiftblade that you - and others - have written in this thread would NOT be one I would expect to want to play one, or even find the offer to play one acceptable. If you find that your complaints in this very thread against the PrC are mere minor quibbles, that's not at all how they come across, and the mere fact that you took the time to write (multiple posts) detailing the PrC's faults reinforces the notion that you feel strongly that it's not good enough.

People, in my experience, do not complain about things that are to their liking or that they find satisfactory. Perhaps you are different, and enjoy complaining about the things you truly enjoy; if that's so, more power to you.

[DarkSonic1337]

Not everyone enters swiftblade as a martial wizard with flaws (Battle Sorcerer entry anyone?) And some people even might want to mix "Swiftblade" with other ideas. Maybe a Swiftblade two weapon fighter? Swiftblade with some metamagic stuff on the side?

So yes, 6 feats without flaws and no bonus feats is too much in my opinion. So I cut out spelldancer and may not even go abjurant champion.

I like the swiftblade class. The features it gets are cool, cool enough that I understand it losing 3-4 caster levels. Feat taxes just really annoy me, because...well there are a lot of really cool feats. If I went spell dancer I'd have to give up my cool invisible spell and/or sculpt spell, might not have room for arcane strike or versatile spellcaster, and won't get to try out mobile spellcasting for kicks. 2 feat taxes I can stomach because I just like the class that much, but 4 feats? Nah.

Mobility is so bad that some of my DMs actually houserule it and dodge together into one feat (and also make the +1 AC from dodge apply all the time).

[Zombulian]

gosh, you are right.
But i am quite sure i saw some way to go in as a cleric (with all the combat perks this entails). But it seems there was some high level of cheese involved, which makes it quite unlikely to happen.


and there was some way to get easily in via trapsmith, i think, but i do not remember exactly.

You play a Cleric with the Kobold domain to get Trapfinding and go into Trapsmith.

[Eldariel]

If I, as DM, had a Player complain that Swiftblade was too Feat intensive and use the "50+ encounters to get my stuff" argument, I could only conclude that the Player found the "Feat tax" too egregious, else why would the complaint have reached the level of mentioning it to the DM.

If I, as DM, had a Player complain with the exact 2nd paragraph that you wrote above, I could only conclude that the large list of caveats immediately after "but" are to be understood as "but I couldn't play it, as written."

In other words, any Player I've seen who voiced the complaints against Swiftblade that you - and others - have written in this thread would NOT be one I would expect to want to play one, or even find the offer to play one acceptable. If you find that your complaints in this very thread against the PrC are mere minor quibbles, that's not at all how they come across, and the mere fact that you took the time to write (multiple posts) detailing the PrC's faults reinforces the notion that you feel strongly that it's not good enough.

People, in my experience, do not complain about things that are to their liking or that they find satisfactory. Perhaps you are different, and enjoy complaining about the things you truly enjoy; if that's so, more power to you.

I'm extremely confused. In my experience people specifically complain about things they like because those are the things they spend the most time with and thus the flaws become all the more apparent. You feel the flaws in what you use, not in what you don't use. As an example, I like D&D 3.5 (as do probably most of the users of this forum) but that doesn't mean the system doesn't have dozens of gaping flaws (many of which can be corrected with homebrew, sure, but not every DM allows homebrew).

Just because I like or use something doesn't mean it's perfect; to me that's what your statement suggests, that people only like perfect things. That makes no sense to me; it's extremely rare for anything to be perfect, and yet people like things. Far as details of the system go, entry problems are one of the lesser ones since it is indeed possible to get the feats you need. That doesn't mean I'm happy taking Dodge and Mobility though, or in general happy about feat tax. It sure isn't required power-wise; yeah, the class is strong but it also gives up 4 levels of casting over the 10 levels. As such, I think the feat tax is stupid (as basically all feat taxes are; this is not without even touching upon the problem that feat tax basically means pre-planned characters are the only ones that can enter PRCs you might want without retraining). The class is great! I love playing Swiftblades.

However, giving up a huge part of the most sparse character customization tool in the system to enter that class is kind of a downer in my books. It really restricts what you can do with the class for no good reason. Power isn't the reason; Swiftblade is still weaker than or at best on par with its parent class, without accounting for the feat tax. It also doesn't really bring the class on par with lower tier classes so it doesn't accomplish much in that regard either. Fluff isn't a good reason; Dodge and Mobility are some of the worst feats to showcase a character is nimble and hard to hit (since they don't actually come into play a whole lot; having the name "Mobility" doesn't actually mean the feat makes you mobile unless it actually gives you an effect that increases your mobility, instead of a useless bonus against a type of AoO you basically never provoke). As such, the entry requirements are a pointless hassle to enter a wonderful, fun class. Therefore, I dislike them.

My dislike won't stop me from playing Swiftblades and I'll take the prerequisite feats if my DM forces me to, but that's just 'cause everything can't always be perfect. I'm not going to turn down a game just because a DM wants to roll for stats instead of point buy even though I prefer the latter system. There can be mitigating factors, it can still be fun, but I'll find it less enjoyable than if it were on point buy. Everything can't be perfect though so we'll often have to make do with the imperfect to get anything at all.

[Xaragos]

Interesting thread.

Fortified Hustle (Ex) ???

It basically states that if you are under the effects of a haste spell you cast yourself, it becomes extraordinary rather than continuous spell effect.

So my question is, if you cast haste on yourself, and then someone puts you in an Antimagic Field (everything magic but Ex abilities nullified), would all your abilities still function in there that are the result of your haste spell because said spell is now considered ex?

[Eldariel]

Interesting thread.

Fortified Hustle (Ex) ???

It basically states that if you are under the effects of a haste spell you cast yourself, it becomes extraordinary rather than continuous spell effect.

So my question is, if you cast haste on yourself, and then someone puts you in an Antimagic Field (everything magic but Ex abilities nullified), would all your abilities still function in there that are the result of your haste spell because said spell is now considered ex?

All the Ex-abilities of the class and the effects of Haste itself. So basically, yes. That's why the Su/Ex-distinction exists, so you know which works under AMF and which doesn't.

[Xaragos]

Wow so basically: Swift Surge(Ex), *Blurred Alacrity(Ex), Sudden Casting(Ex), Arcane Reflexes(Ex), *Evasive Celerity(Ex), Fortified Hustle (Ex), and the normal Haste stuff are all both castable and usable in AMF due to Diligent Rapidity (Ex).

The two main ones with * require haste to be cast.

[Snowbluff]

Casting Haste is still a spell, so it still can be counter spelled and is affect by AMF (sometimes...).

[Eldariel]

Casting Haste is still a spell, so it still can be counter spelled and is affect by AMF (sometimes...).

While cast. After that it's an extraordinary effect immune to dispelling and AMFs and the like.

[Snowbluff]

Yep.

Also, as an (Ex) effect, Incantatrix doesn't worth with it.