High Speed Archer

[Blackhawk748]

Recently ive been kicking around the idea of making a highly mobile archer (if i ever get to PC again). Now obviously hes going to be a Swift Hunter and while Scout 4/Ranger 16 is simple and more or less does what i want its not quite all there. To make things easy heres what i want him to do:


Be Mobile
Be good with a Bow
(this one is optional) Be able to use his Skirmish at more than 30 ft


Rough plan now is something like this: Human Ranger 2/Scout 4/Ranger X

Feats
1. Brachiation, Point Blank Shot
3. Precise Shot
6. Travel Devotion, Swift Hunter (with Scout Bonus Feat
9. Manyshot
12 Greater Manyshot

Also im thinking of making him an Undead hunter, so im hoping i can convince my DM to let me take Death's Ruin as a Scout and to trap out my Animal Companion for Turn Undead as a Paladin.

As always thanks for the help.

[Curmudgeon]

The Ranged Skirmisher feat (Dragon # 346, page 87) extends the usual 30' range limit for skirmish to 60'.

[Blackhawk748]

The Ranged Skirmisher feat (Dragon # 346, page 87) extends the usual 30' range limit for skirmish to 60'.

Wonderful that solves half of my problems right there.

[Barbarian Horde]

Splitting Enchantment on your Bow. All arrows are doubled. Then with many shot go ahead and boost your dex for extra arrows.

[Curmudgeon]

Splitting Enchantment on your Bow. All arrows are doubled. Then with many shot go ahead and boost your dex for extra arrows.
There's a problem there, for a skirmisher, if you use Rules Compendium. From page 42:
A form of attack that enables an attacker to make multiple attacks during an action other than a full-round action, such as the Manyshot feat (standard action) or a quickened scorching ray (swift action), allows precision damage to be applied only to the first attack in the group.

[Milodiah]

I recommend keeping a few potions of Spider Climb on your person at all times, simply for the hilarity that can occur in combination with a high base speed, Shot on the Run, multiple attacks per round, and Many/Multishot.

[Extra Anchovies]

There's a problem there, for a skirmisher, if you use Rules Compendium. From page 42:

Hm. Greater Manyshot + Splitting would allow precision on all arrows, though, yes?

[Curmudgeon]

Hm. Greater Manyshot + Splitting would allow precision on all arrows, though, yes?
Nope.

Your precision-based damage applies to each arrow fired, and, if you score a critical hit with more than one of the arrows, each critical hit deals critical damage. There's an exception built right into the feat there, so it has to work as stated — with the arrows you fire. However, Splitting makes every arrow which hits not the arrow you fired, so you've thrown away the built-in exception.

[Extra Anchovies]

Nope.
There's an exception built right into the feat there, so it has to work as stated — with the arrows you fire. However, Splitting makes every arrow which hits not the arrow you fired, so you've thrown away the built-in exception.

Oh, that's an odd little quirk. So then Splitting is really best for volley archers, and is detrimental to Skirmish archers. Huh.

[Curmudgeon]

Oh, that's an odd little quirk. So then Splitting is really best for volley archers, and is detrimental to Skirmish archers. Huh.
Unless you make those the same character. Dip a level of Monk, train with a Sparring Dummy of the Master, and you're good to go. You can take a 10' step, qualifying you for skirmish damage, then make a full attack. You won't need Greater Manyshot.

[killianh]

If allowed it might be worth looking into a 2 level dip into deepwood sniper from Masters of the wild. full BAB and good ref, d8s for HD, arrows count as keen for free, +10ft for your range, 10% less miss chance from concealment, the spell magic weapon for your bow (CL=DWS lvl), AND Crits go up a multiplier so you could use either a regular bow for 19-20/x4, or for extra cheese kaorti heavy repeating crossbow and you have a 17-20/x5 weapon plus skirmish

[Gwendol]

Recently ive been kicking around the idea of making a highly mobile archer (if i ever get to PC again). Now obviously hes going to be a Swift Hunter and while Scout 4/Ranger 16 is simple and more or less does what i want its not quite all there. To make things easy heres what i want him to do:


Be Mobile
Be good with a Bow
(this one is optional) Be able to use his Skirmish at more than 30 ft


Rough plan now is something like this: Human Ranger 2/Scout 4/Ranger X

Feats
1. Brachiation, Point Blank Shot
3. Precise Shot
6. Travel Devotion, Swift Hunter (with Scout Bonus Feat
9. Manyshot
12 Greater Manyshot

Also im thinking of making him an Undead hunter, so im hoping i can convince my DM to let me take Death's Ruin as a Scout and to trap out my Animal Companion for Turn Undead as a Paladin.

As always thanks for the help.

You probably want the Quick trait (+10' movement, -1 HP/level). Turn undead seems to be a bit of a waste on that build, what with CHA likely not being very high on your list of priorities.

[ILM]

I actually made one some time ago, which went Human Ranger 2/ Conjurer 1/ Scout 4/ Abjurant Champion 4/ Swiftblade 9, abusing double Greater Multishots with splitting arrows every round. While she does use precision damage (while I don't doubt the surgical accuracy of Curmudgeon's statements regarding the interaction of Splitting and Greater Manyshot, we ruled otherwise), even without it she can still throw out 16 projectiles a round (2 splitting Greater Manyshots), each dealing around 1d8+25 to 30 non-precision damage depending on the enchantments you manage to slap on your bow. The Abjurant Champion's Arcane Boost is actually useful here too. The only significant houserule in play is that Mage Armor is Abjuration, but the build is fairly feat-heavy and relies quite a bit on retraining rules (or Psychic Reformation or Dark Chaos Shuffle if you swing that way).

Swiftblade is actually a really cool class for a volley archer. On a personal level, I also like that she has some spellcasting so as not to be completely useless at high levels, but sufficiently limited that I don't feel like I've just made a wizard with a bow.

[Heliomance]

Oh, that's an odd little quirk. So then Splitting is really best for volley archers, and is detrimental to Skirmish archers. Huh.

NB: Curmudgeon, while usually right, takes an exceptionally precise and legalistic view of RAW even by Playground standards. Real world DMs are frequently more forgiving on such matters. YMMV, AYDM.

[Riculf]

For a skirmish archer, OotBI (CW p68) does well in this situation if you're only shooting single arrows in scout skirmish standard attack. The extra 5d8 on each standard-shot arrow is OK and you get Extended Precision at lvl 10. It's certainly worked for me with a Scout/Ranger/OotBI (with Swift Hunter) mobile close assault archer :smallsmile:

[AnonymousPepper]

Unless you make those the same character. Dip a level of Monk, train with a Sparring Dummy of the Master, and you're good to go. You can take a 10' step, qualifying you for skirmish damage, then make a full attack. You won't need Greater Manyshot.

Why bother dipping monk? UMD'll let you use it relatively easily (DC20 to emulate a class feature, in this case being a monk) provided you're lawful; a lot of people forget that, but monks do have to be lawful! If not, then you'll need to also make a separate DC30 UMD check for emulating alignment (in this case, lawful).

Step 1: Put a cross-class rank into UMD (or, in the course of your build, at some point have a level in a class with UMD as a class skill if it worries you that much; I think Darrin's maximum skirmish dice progression build has a class in it that does). This allows you to use the skill. Then take one of two alternate paths:

Step 2a: Acquire a Masterwork Tool of UMD. This isn't *strictly* necessary, but the bonus it gives you is Competence and thus will stack with the next thing on the list so long as it's not a competence booster.

Step 3a: Acquire a UMD booster of at least the ~+10 range. This allows you to relatively reliably make the check to use the Sparring Dummy (or make it every time, if you have at least a total of +20 to your UMD [between CHAMOD, ranks, masterwork tools, and skill boosters], or 30 if non-lawful).

Alternatively,

Step 2b: Acquire a minor schema granting you usage of the Guidance of the Avatar spell (Clr2); this combined with a rank will allow you to autosucceed if lawful, and if non-lawful, this in combination with anything else giving you another cumulative +9 will allow that to work as well. As I recall, because it is a schema, you need not roll UMD to activate it. However, this may not work if the DM decides you need to roll more than once per day, in which case getting your UMD up to a natural +19/+29 via method A will be necessary.

[Curmudgeon]

You'll need to make DC 21 on your Emulate a Class Feature at least 8 times a day.
You make a Use Magic Device check each time you activate a device such as a wand. If you are using the check to emulate an alignment or some other quality in an ongoing manner, you need to make the relevant Use Magic Device check once per hour. Of course, your DM could require you to make the check for every level 1 Monk class feature, meaning that number of checks every hour without any failures.

If you don't have at least a +20 UMD modifier, you don't want to try training with a Sparring Dummy of the Master. One failure and you have to begin the cycle of 224 unbroken successes all over. A second failure any you'll have wasted your money and time and will never benefit from the training.

[Blackhawk748]

You probably want the Quick trait (+10' movement, -1 HP/level). Turn undead seems to be a bit of a waste on that build, what with CHA likely not being very high on your list of priorities.

Turn undead is there only to fuel my Devotion feats, so my CHA doesnt need to be high.

[Gwendol]

Why not dip a level of cleric instead then as that will solve the problem immediately?

[Darrin]

Wonderful that solves half of my problems right there.

If your DM doesn't allow Dragon Magazine material, consider:

Race: Human, Azurin, Strongheart Halfing, or Frostblood Orc/Half-Orc
1) Ranger 1. Feat: Travel Devotion (Complete Champion), Human: PB Shot, Bonus: Track. Wild Empathy -> Spiritual Connection ACF (Complete Champion). Favored Enemy: Undead.
2) Ranger 2. Bonus: Rapid Shot.
3) Scout 1. Feat: Rapid Reload. Skirmish 1d6
4) Fighter 1. Bonus: Weapon Focus: Light Crossbow.
5) Scout 2. Skirmish 1d6.
6) Scout 3. Feat: Crossbow Sniper (PHBII). Skirmish 1d6AC+1.
7) Scout 4. Bonus: Swift Hunter. Skirmish 2d6AC+1.
8) Ranger 3. Bonus: Endurance. Skirmish 2d6AC+2.
9) Ranger 4. Champion of the Wild ACF -> Bonus: Manyshot (Complete Champion), Feat: Improved Rapid Shot. Animal Companion -> Distracting Attack ACF (PHBII) or Spiritual Guide ACF (Complete Champion).
10) Ranger 5. Favored Enemy: Constructs. Skirmish 3d6AC+2.
11) Dragon Devotee 1.
12) Dragon Devotee 2. Feat: Improved Skirmish. Skirmish 4d6AC+2/6d6AC+4.
13) Dragon Devotee 3. 1st level Sorcerer casting (pick at least 2 divination spells, such as true strike and sniper's shot, ask DM to let skirmish count).
14) Dragon Devotee 4. Skirmish 5d6AC+2/7d6AC+4
15) Unseen Seer 1. Feat: Travel Devotion (x2). Skirmish 6d6AC+2/8d6AC+4
16) Unseen Seer 2. Advanced Learning: hunter's eye (PHBII spell)
17) Unseen Seer 3.
18) Unseen Seer 4. Feat: Travel Devotion (x3). Skirmish 7d6AC+2/9d6AC+4
19) Highland Stalker 1.
20) Highland Stalker 2. Skirmish 8d6AC+2/10d6AC+4

Note: Take Dragonblood of Bahumat after ECL 8 for the Wings aspect, drop Endurance instead of your human bonus feat. (This also removes the multiclass XP penalty for the fighter dip.)

If you want to squeeze in a Cloistered Cleric 1 dip instead of the Fighter 1 dip, there's a LG deity called Mouqol with light crossbow as a favored weapon. He doesn't have the War domain, but we can fix that with Planar Touchstone -> Catalogues of Enlightenment. He does have Travel, Knowledge, and Trickery, so we can pick up those three devotions.

Race: Frostblood Half-Orc.
1) Ranger 1. Feat: PB Shot, Bonus: Track. Wild Empathy -> Spiritual Connection ACF (Complete Champion). Favored Enemy: Undead.
2) Ranger 2. Bonus: Rapid Shot.
3) Scout 1. Feat: Rapid Reload. Skirmish 1d6
4) Cloistered Cleric 1. Bonus: Travel Devotion, Knowledge Devotion, Trickery Devotion.
5) Ranger 3. Endurance -> Planar Touchstone -> WF Light Crossbow.
6) Scout 2. Feat: Crossbow Sniper.
7) Scout 3. Skirmish 1d6AC+1.
8) Scout 4. Bonus: Swift Hunter. Skirmish 2d6AC+1.
9) Ranger 4. Champion of the Wild ACF -> Bonus: Manyshot (Complete Champion), Feat: Improved Rapid Shot. Animal Companion -> Distracting Attack ACF (PHBII) or Spiritual Guide ACF (Complete Champion).
10) Ranger 5. Favored Enemy: Constructs. Skirmish 3d6AC+2.
11) Dragon Devotee 1.
12) Dragon Devotee 2. Feat: Improved Skirmish. Skirmish 4d6AC+2/6d6AC+4.
13) Dragon Devotee 3. 1st level Sorcerer casting (pick at least 2 divination spells, such as true strike and sniper's shot, ask DM to let skirmish count).
14) Dragon Devotee 4. Skirmish 5d6AC+2/7d6AC+4
15) Unseen Seer 1. Feat: Extra Turning. Skirmish 6d6AC+2/8d6AC+4
16) Unseen Seer 2. Advanced Learning: hunter's eye (PHBII spell)
17) Unseen Seer 3.
18) Unseen Seer 4. Feat: Woodland Archer (RotW). Skirmish 7d6AC+2/9d6AC+4
19) Highland Stalker 1.
20) Highland Stalker 2. Skirmish 8d6AC+2/10d6AC+4

[AnonymousPepper]

You'll need to make DC 21 on your Emulate a Class Feature at least 8 times a day. Of course, your DM could require you to make the check for every level 1 Monk class feature, meaning that number of checks every hour without any failures.

If you don't have at least a +20 UMD modifier, you don't want to try training with a Sparring Dummy of the Master. One failure and you have to begin the cycle of 224 unbroken successes all over. A second failure any you'll have wasted your money and time and will never benefit from the training.


Ah, that's what the rule was. I forgot how often you had to make the check.