Telflammar Shadowlord

[juicycaboose]

I'm incredibly interested in this class and would love to make a character with it akin to nightcrawler for x-men, but i am seriously stuck on just how to make the character.
I'd also really like to have this character have claw attacks, but I'm stuck on a good way to get those from class levels outside of MoI, and MoI isn't allowed at our table. For that matter neither is ToB!

So, does anyone have any particular suggestions on how to build a simple Telflammar Shadowlord in a low-mid op environment? Natural Attacks optional but encouraged :smallsmile:

[Snowbluff]

Feral Creature, and use the template entry for the class.

I would say try Crinti Shadow Marauder as well. It takes more levels, but it's easier to enter.

[Xervous]

Of course, in practice the ease of entering Crinti Shadow Marauder may very well save you levels in the long run.

If there is no LA buyoff... the optimal entry to Shadowlord costs a minimum of two levels or an excessive degree of feats and possible cheese. Template LA + 1 level of swordsage to get access to Assassin's stance, or sufficient feats or magical items to obtain Assassin's stance.

Of course, you don't have ToB as a resource so you now require at minimum three levels to enter Shadowlord. Thus CSM is a more efficient investment of levels.


For the class to use as a base, I suggest you consider Psychic Warrior. Lots of the PW's powers give you various claws for your melee shenanigans, and the second level power dimension swap is good enough to use to trigger Shadow Pounce.
If you do pick up a psicrystal, and I strongly suggest you do, pick some juicy feats to put on it. But most importantly, know that you can use it as a target for dimension swap.

[Snowbluff]

I would also suggest the Dimensional Jaunt reserve feat. Requires 4th level spells.

[Dusk Eclipse]

If you have access to Dragon Magazine a clawlock is a pretty decent way to enter.

Something like rogue 1/spell thief 1/Warlock 6/Hit and run Fighter 2/Tellflamar Shadowlord 4/ Warlock 6 (or Abjurant Champion 5, you qualify with TSL but advance Warlock)

[Nightraiderx]

Specialist wizard player's handbook 2, abrupt jaunt. +1 immediate action port 10 ft.

3 Rogue for the skill pre-reqs of SA and the Skill pre-reqs

Feral is one way to get claws the other is to use the shifter race and take the razor claw shifting trait.

Another way entry is to take a lvl or two in sorcerer with draconic heritage and grab the draconic claw feat.

[Bonzai]

I am making one for an upcoming campaign. I am going to go Shadow Caster 7/Assassin 3/Teflamar Shadow Lord 4. When I'm all said and done I'll be able to full attack (going two weapon fighting) up to 4 times a round, though usually 3 times. Swift action from anklets of translocation, Standard from the Shadowlords shadow jaunt, a move action from a blink shirt from taking the shape soulmeld feat. Plus I'll have an immediate action one from Flicker.

The other popular way to go is Sword Sage with it's three teleport maneuvers (standard, move, swift), and figuring out alternative means of getting the pre-requisite D.Door effect.

[Nightraiderx]

I am making one for an upcoming campaign. I am going to go Shadow Caster 7/Assassin 3/Teflamar Shadow Lord 4. When I'm all said and done I'll be able to full attack (going two weapon fighting) up to 4 times a round, though usually 3 times. Swift action from anklets of translocation, Standard from the Shadowlords shadow jaunt, a move action from a blink shirt from taking the shape soulmeld feat. Plus I'll have an immediate action one from Flicker.

The other popular way to go is Sword Sage with it's three teleport maneuvers (standard, move, swift), and figuring out alternative means of getting the pre-requisite D.Door effect.

He's not allowed Tome of batte, or Magic of incarnum.

[Piggy Knowles]

I actually DON'T like swordsages as shadowpouncers (other than as a quick two-level dip to get +2d6 sneak attack). Shadowpouncing is something you want to do pretty much every round, and swordsages have the worst recovery mechanic of the ToB classes. I'd much rather stick it on a warblade instead. I've got a few builds that add the Shadow Jaunt/Stride/Blink maneuvers to a warblade chassis, so that you can shadow pounce three times in a round, then recover your maneuvers alongside a full attack the following round.

That said, if you're not looking at ToB, and you want something with natural attacks, I'm fond of...

Azurin, Rogue 1/Totemist 2/Fighter 2/Umbral Disciple 3/Telflammar Shadowlord 4/Swiftblade 8

(If you don't plan to play all the way to level 20, drop the two fighter levels for Cobra Strike monk instead - you get better skills, an extra feat and some useful class features like Invisible Fist. However, switching to monk means you finish with +15 BAB instead of +16 for that last iterative attack.)

EDIT: Missed the no MoI, sorry. I'll give a non-ToB, non-MoI shadowpouncing build some thought.

[Dusk Eclipse]

My clawlocknbuild works without those sources, but it's restricted to 2 shadowpounces per round (with quicken spell-like), though items can help tons (shadow cloak ia abrupt jaunt 3/day for the low price of 8k gp).

I'm away from books right now,what type of action does TSL' Shadow jumop requires?

[Piggy Knowles]

Hmm. Just got a cool idea.

Take a look at the spell protective interposition from Forge of War. It's a first level spell with a swift action casting. You and an ally within touch range trade places, your ally gets a defensive boosts, and you get +2 to any melee attacks you make this round.

Of course, you could also use it on, say, a familiar who is sharing your space or traveling with you, as a swift action way to get an extra full attack (and a bonus to your attack rolls to boot) if you're already adjacent to your enemy.

It's a cleric and paladin spell, but now I'm trying to think of a Chameleon build that could pull it off, especially since it's both less cheesy and more effective than dropping prone and using stand to shadowpounce.

[Dusk Eclipse]

Hmmm rogue 1/spellthief 1/cobra strike invisible fist monk 2/something 1/chameleon x/TFSL 4/ finish chameleon/something 1?

[Piggy Knowles]

A level of cloistered cleric for divine metamagic would not go amiss.

[Dusk Eclipse]

Can you use the turn attempts from Chameleon to fuel DMM?

[Ansem]

I've build a character using Duskblade13/Warrior1(bonus feat for 2d6 SA)/Telflammar Shadowlord 6 with the Shadow-walker template.

[(Un)Inspired]

Why not go Swordsage 3 for the sneak attack and sp, then feat rogue 2 to cut into that load of feats you need to take and for more sp, then ardent 2 with practiced manifested and overchannel so you can learn psionic dimensional door.

Finish off the build with more ardent for more powers known and pp or with warblade so you can have some maneuvers that can be recovered in a humane manner.

[Dread_Head]

X5 / Trapsmith 1 / Swiftblade 3 / Telflammar Shadowlord 4-5 / Y6-7

Where X provides +3BAB and 2d6 SA
And Y is any class to top the build out

If using MoI then Rogue 1 / Totemist 2 / Rogue 2 works great for X for move action DD for an additional Shadowpounce.
Using Psychic Rogue (http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/psm/20040723b) 5 for X with Expanded Knowledge (Claws of the Beast (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/psionic/powers/clawsoftheBeast.htm)) gets claws as well as some other low level powers.

Trapsmith used to qualify for Swiftblade with Haste as a 1st level spell and to qualify for TSL with DD as a second. Swiftblade used to progress Trapsmith for 2 further levels with better class features and to gain Spring Attack without spending the feat.

[GhengisConrad]

Shaman from Oriental Adventures gets you DimDoor at 7th level with a semi-favorable attack bonus and some nifty abilities.

If you have access to abjurant champion, that can help too.

Also, don't underestimate the value of the contemplative for dim door through a domain spell.

[(Un)Inspired]

I don't think you can qualify for swiftblade with trapsmith in that way. The prereqs specifically state that you need to use all your 3RD level spell slots to cast haste and 1 level of trapsmith doesn't get you any 3rd level slots...

[Dusk Eclipse]

There is a forum quote by the Swiftblade creator that says that he didn't know of the trapsmith while designing the swiftblade, but if he had he would have wrote the pre-reqs so it allowed qualification by Trapsmith, I'll see if I can dig it out.

Edit: Found it!




Speaking from an intent perspective (which I know counts for very little in the optimized forums) the idea is for the swiftblade candidate to use all spell slots (of the level in which haste is gained) to cast haste. The Dungeonscape book did not exist when Brian and I originally created the swiftblade, leaving us completely unaware of the trapsmith prestige class when it was finally released. If we had been aware, the special prerequisite would have read...

Special: Must have spent the entire previous level using all spell slots of the level in which haste is gained to exclusively cast haste.

[Dread_Head]

I think the guy who wrote Swiftblade said that it was written before Trapsmith was released and it should be amended to say all slots of the level you gained Haste are used to cast it.

Also this would be a pretty fun build although I know it uses MoI which the OP doesn't have. The two Totemist Levels and 2 Soulcaster levels could be replaced with four more levels progressing wizard casting.
Rogue 1 / Focused Specialist Conjuror 3 / Spellthief 1 / Trapsmith 1 / Swiftblade 3 / TFSL 4 / Totemist 2 / Swiftblade 3 / Soulcaster 2
Abrupt Jaunt or Anklet of Translocation for 1 Shadow Pounce, Dimension Hop for a second, then Move action DD from Totemist for a third. Plus a few utility soulmelds, 6th level Swiftblade abilities and some low level casting for utility.
Forgot to mention requires fractional BAB as well

Edit: Ninja'd

[(Un)Inspired]

Well that's incredibly cool. Just make sure you DM sees the creators post.

[Chronos]

The easiest way to get claws is to be a kobold, using the Races of the Dragon web enhancement. No feats, class levels, or LA required. You also get a bite, and it's not too hard to get an attack out of your tail, either (I think that costs a feat).

[Piggy Knowles]

Can you use the turn attempts from Chameleon to fuel DMM?

You can use them to fuel DMM, but not to qualify for DMM.

[juicycaboose]

If you have access to Dragon Magazine a clawlock is a pretty decent way to enter.

Something like rogue 1/spell thief 1/Warlock 6/Hit and run Fighter 2/Tellflamar Shadowlord 4/ Warlock 6 (or Abjurant Champion 5, you qualify with TSL but advance Warlock)

I quite like this build although I'm not sure clawlock would fly, would have to do some convincing to allow dragon mag, esp. seeing as i'm already using a 3.0 prestige class :~)
hit and run fighter is probably a hard sell too


I would also suggest the Dimensional Jaunt reserve feat. Requires 4th level spells.

This is something I definitely will be getting if I go a wizard or sorcerer route

I also forgot to mention that psionics is a no-go at our table :(

Are there any ways to get a claw attack with dwarf as a base race, and without a template? Or at the least with a +0 LA template. (also of course without MoI/ToB/psionics)

I'm imagining this is a p. severe restriction but unfortunately my DM isn't fond of +1LA anythings and I would rather like to play a dwarf as this character, i have a particular backstory/image already forming in my head.

[GhengisConrad]

Doi. Mark of Passage fro Eberron. That'll get you in reeeeal cheaplike.