Building a Shadowpouncer (3.5)

[D4rkh0rus]

Given that 3.0 material is allowed...
I wanna build a shadowpouncer. Telflammar Shadowlord to be precise (No, I don't want to use Crinti shadow marauder. I just don't.)


What I got so far is this:

Factotum 3 (Iaijutsu Focus)/Hit and Run Fighter 1/Cloistered Cleric 1/Totemist 2/Telflammar shadowlord 4/something 9

For feats, I was thinking this:
1 Able learner
1 Darkstalker
1 Exotic Weapon Proficiency (Gnomish Quickrazor)
1 Dodge
3 +2d6 SA (generalist classes) (would this be considered way too cheesy?)
4 Two weapon fighting
5 Knowledge Devotion
5 Time Domain (Imp. Init)
5 Darkness Domain (Blind fight)
6 Spring Attack
9 Craven
12
15 Greater Two weapon fighting?
18

With mobility enhancement on armor, feycraft quickrazors and gloves of two weapon fighting (the ones that give you twf or Itwf if you have the first one)

What I can't decide on, is what to to take after shadowlord 4, I got 9 lvls, and from what I read, Sad lord 5 and 6 aren't really worth the levels? What should I take?

[Piggy Knowles]

3 +2d6 SA (generalist classes) (would this be considered way too cheesy?)


Almost certainly, yes. Generalist classes really aren't meant to be mixed in with non-generalist classes, and the class-features-as-feats are DEFINITELY not intended to be used by non-generic classes. You MIGHT get away with mixing generalist and non-generalist with a liberal DM, but I can't think of any table that would let it fly as so.

As to what you can fill in for the remaining levels... well, Telflammar Shadowlord and Master of Nine share very similar pre-reqs, and if you mix in some initiating, you can get access to things like Shadow Stride and Shadow Blink, for move/swift action teleportation.

Ideally you'll want to use Mo9 on top of a warblade chassis - shadowpouncers want to spam their teleportation maneuvers, so the swordsage's full round recovery just isn't worth it. I'd mix in some warblade and Mo9, then. You can even use your first stance from Mo9 to nab Assassin's Stance if you time it right, giving you +2d6 sneak attack without spending a feat - but keep in mind that this will delay when you get shadowpounce by at least two levels.

So you could do something like Warblade 7/Cobra Strike Monk 2/Hit-and-Run Fighter 1/Cloistered Cleric 1/Master of Nine 5/Telflammar Shadowlord 4 if you went that route, with a level breakdown that looked something like...

1. Warblade1- Darkstalker, Least Dragonmark (Mark of Passage)
2. Cobra Strike Monk1- Improved Unarmed Strike, Dodge
3. Cobra Strike Monk2- Mobility, Spring Attack
4. Warblade2-
5. Cloistered Cleric1- Knowledge Devotion, Improved Initiative, Blind-Fight
6. H&R Fighter1- Martial Study (Shadow Jaunt), Lesser Dragonmark (Mark of Passage)
7. Warblade3-
8. Warblade4-
9. Warblade5- Adaptive Style, Ironheart Aura
10. Master of Nine1-
11. Master of Nine2-
12. Telflammar Shadowlord1- Snap Kick
13. Telflammar Shadowlord2-
14. Telflammar Shadowlord3-
15. Telflammar Shadowlord4- Craven
16. Warblade6-
17. Master of Nine3-
18. Warblade7- Stormguard Warrior
19. Master of Nine4-
20. Master of Nine5-

The last levels are mixed up like that to allow for picking up Shadow Blink without needing to spend another feat, which frees you up to take Stormguard Warrior. Enjoy making three full attacks a round!

[Regissoma]

If you can convince your DM that any spell slot level of haste counts for the special requirement for Swiftblade I would go Swiftblade. Since you get haste as a 2nd level spell from the Shadowlord class you might get away with it. That hasting ability and that extra standard action are so good.

Link for Swiftblade:
http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/prc/20070327

[Snowbluff]

DB13/Shadow Marauder5.

Channel D Hop.

TWF your GS with armor spikes. Full attack a guy, hit yourself with your spikes. Full Attack again...

You can sub in that other class with a Rogue 3 dip or something. :smallyuk:

[AlsoD]

For a higher powered game, I'd recommend starting with Warblade 2/X 1/Crusader 1. Take all the Stone Dragon and White Raven strikes as your 4 Warblade maneuvers known. At 3rd level take Martial Study: Crusader's Strike.

At 4th level, since you can't gain a maneuver twice and you already know most of the available ones, you are a Crusader with only one maneuver known, Vanguard Strike. Take Martial Study: Shadow Jaunt, Extra Granted Maneuver and Martial Study: Shadow Stride. Since you have three known maneuvers and three granted ones, every turn you refresh all your maneuvers.

Mix with some classes that 1) grant sneak attack and 2) have a spellcasting progression such as Spellthief (take Master Spellthief) and Assassin.

Later take Sublime Chord and you'll be 3 levels behind a wizard BUT consider a
Warblade 2/Bard 1/Crusader 1/Spellthief 1/Assassin 1/X 1/Telf 4/Sublime Chord 2/Y 7
here X is any class with its own arcane casting progression (Wu Jen gives a bonus metamagic feat for example) and Y is any prestige class that continues arcane casting progressions (Incantatrix is sublime as ever, a class that gives Circle Magic is INSANE but that's pretty normal - CL 240 anybody?).

This build gets 9th level arcane spells, a caster level of 78* and (Ex) teleports as a standard and move action every round. If X is Ur-priest, Y is Mystic Theuge (you need an early entry trick to get second level divine spells) and you only take SC 1 then the arcane CL goes down to 65 but you get 9th level cleric spells too (even if their caster level is only 16).


The trouble with this build is that the BAB is pretty low, although 9th level arcane spells make that not really a problem. If you have access to pathfinder, check out the feat Dimensional Dervish instead of bothering with the Idiot Crusader build: essentially you get n+1 teleports where n is your number of attacks in a full attack action. Yeah.

*: Thanks to Master Spellthief + SC, CL = (levels in Telf + levels in SC) x number of classes with their own caster level = 13*6 = 78

e: I should probable say that for this build I haven't really checked multi-class penalties or cross-class skills since I usually play with pathfinder's core replacing 3.5's core and so these don't come into play for me. If you're playing in 3.5 you might have to swap some levels around (savage bard could go before warblade for example)/have a high int/spend some more of your few available feats. You also need 3rd level spells to qualify for Sublime Chord despite Telf 4 only giving 2nd level spells, but that's not too hard either.

[Trundlebug]

Totally SS'd. Was going to say needs more ToB.

[AlsoD]

The thing that I really like about the Telf/SC build is that it works so well together!

Master Spellthief + SC is an amazing combo to get a really high caster level;
Spellthief and assassin both grant sneak attack at level 1 and have their own arcane casting for SC (I believe they're the only two classes in all of 3.5 that do so);
SC works better if you've previously taken a few levels of a spellcasting class and NOT prestiged i.e. 4 levels of Telf;
Bard makes Sublime Chord easier to qualify for, opens up Snowflake Wardance, Metamagic Song and other music-related options, and has its own arcane casting.


e: I'm pretty sure this is the only good use for DMG's Assassin prestige class in the entirety of 3.5