Embarrassing combos you thought of as a newbie

[Bad Wolf]

Anything you thought would've been good idea at the start of your DnD career, only to look back now and realize they were horrible?

I'll start. I thought Light Armor Proficiency and Martial Weapon Proficiency (rapier) would be the best feats ever for a first level Sorcerer.

EDIT: It doesn't count if you actually had fun playing with it.

[atemu1234]

VoP + Monk.

[Dusk Eclipse]

Not a combo really, but back when I first started I actually dumped Con to 10 in all my characters my thought process was something like "Con doesn't affect anything but HP and Fort saves, who would ever put points in this? I mean you will always get HP."

[Hrugner]

I combined a legitimately optimized combat cleric with a game full of low optimized players and a DM who focused on melee heavy encounters. I damn near killed the game and I don't think that DM tried running any more than a couple of sessions before it fell apart and he stopped DMing for a year.

More in line with the thread's expectations though: I thought combining a wizard and a duelist would give me an amazing caster with good defenses and decent melee offense. Obviously I didn't think through exactly what swapping to a melee class progression would do at level 12.

[Pluto!]

Grey Elf Swashbuckler+Bladesinger+Keen Instincts Intellect was where it was at.

[BowStreetRunner]

VoP + Monk.

This. I think that character lasted about 3/4 of one session before I started to realize my mistake.

[Tvtyrant]

Cobra Strike Monk into Duelist. It fulfills the requirements perfectly, and I had no concept of damage benchmarks.

[Curmudgeon]

Rogue and Two-Weapon Fighting.

[BowStreetRunner]

Rogue and Two-Weapon Fighting.

Hey, that's actually not that bad if you can manage to do it without losing any caster levels.

[Ellowryn]

My first character was a level 3 Paladin with the Mineral Warrior template added. He ended up as a miniature undead spider running round this ancient temple with a small sized great-sword.

My first character that i actually built was a Druid 5(the class variant from Unearthed Arcana that traded wildshape for Monk AC)/Beastmaster 1/Mystic Wanderer 3, going for crazy cat lady. I also had the Greenbound Summoning feat but it was reduced to a +1 adjustment Metamagic Feat that i always used. Oh, and i had a tiger for my Animal companion, focused on grappling, in fights mostly against Hugh+ creatures or undead with negative energy touch. I still don't like playing druids to this day.....

[OldTrees1]

Fighter 4+ / Kensai (died at 4th level)
Not too embarrassing for a 1st character. What was embarassing was I forgot about Combat Expertise and started with 10 Int. So rather than go Fighter 5 / Kensai, I would have to go Fighter 12 / Kensai.

[(Un)Inspired]

Wilder+loosing more than 2 manifester levels

WTF was I thinking? There are people that claim to love me. Why didn't they prevent me from committing such serious self- harm?

[Terazul]

When I first started playing, the first book I ever bought, soley because it sounded cool, was the Expanded Psionics Handbook. The Psychic Warrior caught my eye, and looked awesome. My friend who was running things for us (and usually made all our characters) said he wanted us all to start off as core-dudes and then if we wanted to multiclass do it later, so I settled on Fighter 4/Psychic Warrior X. After all, Fighter was great! I got so many feats and some BAB!

Course I know now that Fighter is at least good for a 2 level dip, but.... I will always miss those manifester levels I didn't understand.

[Draz74]

I thought Ranger into Shadowdancer (with cross-class Perform ranks) was the bee's knees. At least it was the 3.0 version of Shadowdancer.

[Bad Wolf]

I thought Ranger into Shadowdancer (with cross-class Perform ranks) was the bee's knees. At least it was the 3.0 version of Shadowdancer.

I thought Sorcerer/Shadowdancer was amazing.

[atemu1234]

Rogue and Two-Weapon Fighting.

Optimize sneak attack and you can do a fair bit of damage that way.

[Nashira]

Monk/Ranger, you mean I get to be a big money martial artist and have an animal pal? Sign me up bro!

[Alent]

VoP Zen Archery Monk.

Thankfully, well before a chance to roll the character ever happened, a kind soul explained this funny thing called ammo to me by demonstrating how many GP he could shoot at an enemy in a turn.

Dryad, Battledancer, Ninja, something, something something.

I forget the exact build, but it basically revolved around dipping and scrounging as many ways to stack Cha to AC and saves as possible. It had near zero synergy, terrible BAB, couldn't land sudden strikes, gave up too many caster levels, didn't account for the Dryad's ECL, and ultimately ended up being completely nonfunctional due to all the things it had given up to get there. One of these days I do want to revisit the Dryad PC concept and give it a respectable build, but it will look nothing like the original disaster. :smalleek:

[Curmudgeon]

Optimize sneak attack and you can do a fair bit of damage that way.
No, it's really not effective except against enemies with low AC who can be killed in one full attack. Against most enemies (moderate to high AC) you've got all the following against you:

3/4 BAB
-2 to hit from Two-Weapon Fighting
lower +enhancement from having to spend gp to enhance 2 weapons instead of 1
lower sneak attack damage from taking TWF instead of Craven
high chance of dying because TWF requires a full melee attack and you now have to endure a full counterattack

[carrdrivesyou]

Power Attack Shugenja wearing Full Plate and using a shortsword...STR 12.

"I get double my strength damage, that'll work; and my armor won't mess with my divine spells!" -me, much younger

Or, my straight wizard 13 with NO direct damage spells (i.e. fireball, magic missile, orbs, etc.). "I cast air bubble on the dire shark and wait for it to suffocate."

[AvatarVecna]

VoP + Monk.

Seconded. Tried to play one as a cohort; it didn't work out too well in a party with a necromancer wizard (mine), a blaster wizard (my brothers), and a pretty standard halfling druid playing support (DMPC).

EDIT: To help balance it out, I also figured out that, if your DM thinks they should have more say in your cohort's actions than your character does (since the cohort is still an NPC with their own motivations and goals), Oath of Obedience (on account of "my LG character saved the Exalted LG character's life" being in the combined background I gave them) is perfect for giving you final say in your characters cohorts actions.

[Troacctid]

I actually still have some notes from my first character. It was a Bard. Let's see...for potential prestige classes I marked down Exemplar, Lyric Thaumaturge, Seeker of the Song, and Sublime Chord...all of them are crossed out except Sublime Chord, so I guess that's not too embarrassing.

Under potential feats, I have Lyric Spell ("Use bardic music as additional spell slots"), Magical Artisan ("Reduces the cost of magical items from one crafting feat by 75%"), Skill Focus: Perform ("Seeker of the Song"), Shape Soulmeld ("There are some good ones, although they really want you to have actual essentia"), Captivating Melody ("Use bardic music to buff save DC for enchantments and illusions"), and Dimensional Jaunt ("Teleport 20 feet at will as a standard action; +1 CL to teleports"). I guess it's a little embarrassing that I read Magical Artisan as reducing the cost by 75% instead of to 75%.

Oh, here's one. My list of potential 4th level spells includes Flowsight, Dispel Water, and Repel Vermin, among others. This was an amphibious campaign, so the first two aren't as egregious as they might have been, but I'm not sure why I thought Repel Vermin would be worth taking. Looks like I eventually settled on Shadow Conjuration, Dimension Door, and Hallucinatory Terrain, which seems acceptable.

[Marlowe]

I used to think that if I explained what game I played and what I needed advice on in my first post, people would actually give answers relevant to this instead of shilling other games or assuming I wanted something totally different.

[Auron3991]

Dragon race plus caster. I figured it'd give me a good health pool and I'd still be able to cast spells. Didn't have a clue how LA and racial hit die worked.

[ekarney]

WF Artificer (Decent)
Who dumped Charisma AND Intelligence. With no points in UMD.

Yeah I don't know what I was thinking either.

[Aharon]

3.0 Psychic Warrior with that "Go up walls like in Matrix" feat :smallsmile:

I was quickly healed - the next character was a Cleric :smallwink:

[Swaoeaeieu]

my first char was a warforged fighter planning on getting that feat that lets you add shock dmg to your attack in exchance for some dmg you take yourself. I was going to balance that with the metabolism feat that lets a warforged heal himself.

i was so smart, it was gonna be glorious.
sadly the campaign didnt get past level 3.

[Vhaidara]

Monk//Wizard. Core + Complete Arcane only. I thought I'd be punching people with Shocking Grasp. I wasn't.

[Warrnan]

I had a ranger 10/ wizard 10 in the neverwinter nights video game loosely based on 3.5. I think the game balance was off. I had a pixie familiar with improved Invis at will. She'd sneak attack and disappear every round, she also picked all the locks for me. I had A panther animal companion with sneak attack. I would fire ball some enemies. The pixie and Panther would close in while I peppered them with arrows. If they got close I would swap to my two rapiers and finish them off.

Hilariously unoptimized with some unbalanced pets. Still one of the most fun characters ever and she was an elf!

[Elandris Kajar]

One of my first wizards was an evoked who banned Conjuration and Transmutation. I was in love with damage spells.
"Look! I can deal 4d6 more often by giving up fly, haste, summons, teleport, polymorph abd planar binding!"
"Oh! Don't forget magic missile, the most powerful spell henceforth conceived. And at first level! A real bargain."
And of course: "combat casting!"

[EldritchWeaver]

Rogue and Two-Weapon Fighting.
Hey, that's actually not that bad if you can manage to do it without losing any caster levels.

I can't decide if you misquoted or made a joke here.:smallamused:

[Zaq]

Dipping as many Sneak Attack-granting classes as you can to roll a zillion d6 on every Sneak Attack. With, y'know, 0 BAB. And no other class features worth mentioning. Never actually played that particular character, but yeah.

I know I was absolutely enamored of the idea of a Fighter (not a Rogue, not a Ranger) dual-wielding daggers for some reason. I think I was trying to crit-fish? And Weapon Specialization seemed like the coolest thing ever? And I understood that you needed BAB and lots of feats for TWF. I guess I just didn't understand the concept of needing bonus damage (partly because I didn't understand that it wasn't a good idea to spend eight or nine rounds grinding something's HP down).

Also, gishes that need to spend at least one standard action buffing themselves at the start of every combat. Having never seen just how few rounds D&D combats take, that doesn't SOUND like a terrible idea (there are no shortage of video games where buffing up and smashing face is a prime strategy)—after all, it's just one round, right? What's one round in the grand scheme of things?

Finally, making your character really really old because he's a caster and you want high mental stats. A seasoned optimizer can get away with that because we know how to properly build magical defenses, but tanking DEX and CON as a newbie who doesn't know which spells will keep you alive and which will just put you in harm's way? Yeah, I did it. I think the only reason I didn't die before the end of the game was because the game fell apart after three sessions or so.

[LoyalPaladin]

I had a bow and arrow focused ranger without the force enhancement in a campaign filled with primarily dragons. "He's in the sky! I can hit him! I'm sorry? What was that? What's DR? Oh you've got to be kidding me!"

[ComaVision]

My first character was a rogue TWF fighter. The main problem stemmed from me having a 3.0 PHB and referencing the 3.5 SRD. I had Ambidexterity and Two Weapon Fighting as feats, which I interpreted as meaning I had no attack penalty. I also messed up on my point-buy so I had higher stats than everyone else. Over the course of a year or so, we went from level 3 to level 5. That's just as well though, since I was planning on nabbing treasures like Two Weapon Defense.

[danzibr]

High Dex low Str TWF with no precision damage. And I didn't take Weapon Finesse.

[hewhosaysfish]

Sorceror 9/Dragon Disciple 3

DD needs spontaneous casting to take and sorcerors are THE spontaneous casting class so they must be meant to go together. Right? And I get to gradually turn into a (half-)dragon, so that's awesome.

Right?

[danzibr]

Sorceror 9/Dragon Disciple 3

DD needs spontaneous casting to take and sorcerors are THE spontaneous casting class so they must be meant to go together. Right? And I get to gradually turn into a (half-)dragon, so that's awesome.

Right?
I actually agree with the awesome factor.

[AvatarVecna]

I actually agree with the awesome factor.

Half-Dragon sucks enough as a template, especially for a sorcerer, without taking away the possibility of a dragon saying "No, I am your father."

[dascarletm]

No, it's really not effective except against enemies with low AC who can be killed in one full attack. Against most enemies (moderate to high AC) you've got all the following against you:

lower +enhancement from having to spend gp to enhance 2 weapons instead of 1
lower sneak attack damage from taking TWF instead of Craven


Minor Nitpick:
1. Why are we not we using two castings of greater magic weapon?
http://cdn.meme.am/instances/49235395.jpg

I too thought VOP+Monk was awesome.

My terrible mistake was half-fiend + warlock. I mean I have power that comes from the lower planes right? So being half lower-planes will make me more powerful right?

[Mendicant]

It took me several characters to stop building characters that didn't give up caster levels to dip rogue. Rogue/Wizard? Check. Rogue/Cleric? Check. Rogue/Bard? Check. I wasn't building towards a prestige class or anything, I just wanted the character to be rogue-y. I also thought taking my first level in rogue every time for the skill point payoff was a no-brainer.

To be honest, I also haven't completely stopped. I picked up NWN a few months ago on steam, and the first character I built was a Rogue/Bard, because nostalgia is a powerful drug, and there was no party to keep up with/let down.

[MesiDoomstalker]

Lets see....
I made an Elf Duskblade as my very first character, because at the time I was frustrated with the Video Games I was playing that had very strict melee/magic divide (I think it was Dragon Age, not positive). So I wanted someone who was equally proficient at both. I cast exactly 1 spell the entire time and it was Dancing Lights. I had Great Cleave and I was so happy when my 1d8+6 Longsword let me chop off the 1 HD mooks in half at level 12. I was so scared of running out of spells, I never used any.

Then my next character was a Two-Weapon Ninja. We started at level 5, and I realized, super quickly, that Ninja friggin sucked. I book divided and found a solution, mainly in the form of Nightsong Enforcer. So I dipped 2 levels of Rogue (to get Evasion and tangentially UMD). After that, the game died before I even got in my PrC...

In the middle of this game, before I figured out all the inner workings of DnD, I had a beef with our fighter. In a battle with a Dragon, he got knocked from full HP (just over 100) to about 2, because the Dragon Full-Attacked and crit with his Bite attack. You know, the absolute worst possible outcome when facing a Dragon in melee. After that, he was too scared to ever be in melee (despite all his feats focused on his Greatsword). He sat in back and plinked with his Longbow. So I built a theoretical Fighter to put his to shame. I ended up picking Spiked Chain, but went for Whirlwind Attack as the star of the build. I misread it and thought it A) let you attack everyone in your Reach and B) that the Spiked Chain was a double weapon. Don't ask me where I got that idea, I have no idea. I was super proud to show him this build that let you hit everyone near you with one hit that dealt about ~15-25 damage depending on how much you power attacked (at level 6) that round. And then do it twice, because you were 'dual-wielding' (ignore the fact the Spiked Chain isn't a double weapon or that Whirlwind Attack is only adjacent or lets you hit with your off hand either).

If we want to go across editions, I tried to make a traditional 3.5 Cleric (CODzilla) in 4e, picking powers that did the greatest damage, spending a feat on an Executioner's Axe (the highest damage weapon I could find). It didn't work out well.

[Curmudgeon]

Minor Nitpick:
1. Why are we not we using two castings of greater magic weapon?
Because a Rogue isn't a spellcaster, and either 2 or 4 (depending on length of adventuring day) castings of 3rd- or 4th-level spells every day just for maintenance of the weapons of one character is quite a lot of spellcasting value to ask for. With Use Magic Device and a wand at CL 20, that would be 2 charges daily costing 1,800 gp for +5 to 2 weapons. For the cost of 27.78 days of temporary boosts to 2 weapons, you can get a permanent +5 enhancement on 1 weapon instead. The permanent enhancement is much more robust, because it won't disappear on a targeted Dispel Magic.

[Venger]

Not a combo really, but back when I first started I actually dumped Con to 10 in all my characters my thought process was something like "Con doesn't affect anything but HP and Fort saves, who would ever put points in this? I mean you will always get HP."

Well, you're not wrong, as long as your guy's immune to HP damage somehow.

but yeah, otherwise this is a bit of a pitfall we all get into.

my first character was a beguiler. I took weapon finesse because I got proficiency with a rapier. I thought I was being terribly clever because that way I could dump str. why did I need a weapon at all? for when I ran out of spells.

in my defense, I was lvl 4, so I did actually run out of spells. a lot.

[Amphetryon]

"If I combine Monk, Barbarian, the Run Feat, and the Quick trait, I'll be amazingly fast!" - me, before I learned.

[Jagernaut]

My first ever character was a monk. A halfling monk. At the time I didn't know about size categories for damage, so I saw absolutely no downside for being small sized. To be fair I desgined the character to be hard to kill, and boy was he ever. Almost nothing could hit me (I had like 20 dex and focused on mobility and tumbling). Of course I was doing maybe 4 damage a round (12 strength, what was I thinking?), so it was kind of a moot point. The campaign fell apart when me and another first time player got into a fight. His human ninja could barely touch me and I could barely hurt him. It was really anticlimactic as we both realized the fight was going poorly and ran away at the same time.

I should say the DM was amazing, he managed to take our ridiculously unoptimized builds and make a damn fun game. I miss his games.

[RolkFlameraven]

Drow Bard, because look at those stat mods, why would you do any other class! Who worshiped Eilistraee and was going for Bladesinger, or Blade Dancer or Sword Dancer or what ever PrC is attached to her only to read the fine print after I get all the feats and skill points and such that if I really wanted to do this I needed to change out that pesky Y chromosome for a 2nd X!

I'm still not sure how I missed 'female' as a prerequisite but I did.

[Coventry]

3.0 Build: Bard 8/Arcane Archer 10

He would never have to worry about having +5 weapons to beat Damage Reduction ... oh, look, we've migrated to 3.5 and DR got nerfed to "Magic/20".

[Story]

In Pathfinder: Snapdragon Fireworks lets me try to attack someone again every round! And I can share it with my Familiar* letting me make use of their actions! And I can make it a Dazing Spell to try to daze people!

It might have worked better if it weren't a campaign where almost every enemy was fire immune or resistant.

* Doesn't work by RAW, but noone in the game noticed.

[Endarire]

In terms of early 3.0 experience, Half-Elf Wizard. None of the disadvantages of the Elf!

To be fairer, this was Neverwinter Nights.

Also, my first epic campaign (and probably my first 3.0 campaign), I didn't see the appeal in the Red Wizard PrC, back when Spell Power gave a spiffy DC boost. I was also trying to gish back before we had a plethora of gish PrCs and options. Starting at level 30 when our group was generally unfamiliar with the then-new ruleset was much.

[Oko and Qailee]

A cleric with Con dumped, and going into combat medic. Not too bad, but certainly not that good.

Also, I prepared heal spells. I was good.

[Umbranar]

Rolling a wizard:
"Oh my god! I`m level 5 now and look at this gem! Fireball, 20 ft radius 5d6 damage?!?! Ok now for a second spell. Haste only 1 round per level...how bad is that I already have expeditious retreat for movement speed and why on earth would I need an extra attack. Displacement, 1 round per level 50% miss chance...how bad is that!"

Needless to say I went evoker, banned enchantment and necromancy (at least one good school banned).

Later I would discover the power of buffing, debuffing, BFC and summoning.

[atemu1234]

Rolling a wizard:
"Oh my god! I`m level 5 now and look at this gem! Fireball, 20 ft radius 5d6 damage?!?! Ok now for a second spell. Haste only 1 round per level...how bad is that I already have expeditious retreat for movement speed and why on earth would I need an extra attack. Displacement, 1 round per level 50% miss chance...how bad is that!"

Needless to say I went evoker, banned enchantment and necromancy (at least one good school banned).

Later I would discover the power of buffing, debuffing, BFC and summoning.

Meh, Necromancy is the third school on my list of schools I ban. It goes for the most part:

[1]Enchantment
[2]Evocation
[3]Necromancy
[4]Illusion


Most wizards I run ban the first two, then the third if they need to (Incantatrix, etc.).

[Dusk Eclipse]

Well, you're not wrong, as long as your guy's immune to HP damage somehow.

but yeah, otherwise this is a bit of a pitfall we all get into.

my first character was a beguiler. I took weapon finesse because I got proficiency with a rapier. I thought I was being terribly clever because that way I could dump str. why did I need a weapon at all? for when I ran out of spells.

in my defense, I was lvl 4, so I did actually run out of spells. a lot.

Because a newbie would know how to make a character immune to HP damage :smalltongue:

[Lerondiel]

When I first played 3.5 and started with a paladin I'd only seen the PHB.

I was assured Whirlwind Attack was "never worth it" so TWF and Power Attack with dual longswords seemed a great choice...and an extra Cleave attack at 3rd level? Sign me up!

We finished the Sunless Citadel and found this awesome special longsword - Shatterspike - so I had to take Imp Sunder for it to function fully. That's when the rest of the players began to chuckle and ask if I was really attached to being LG...

[RolkFlameraven]

When I first played 3.5 and started with a paladin I'd only seen the PHB.

I was assured Whirlwind Attack was "never worth it" so TWF and Power Attack with dual longswords seemed a great choice...and an extra Cleave attack at 3rd level? Sign me up!

We finished the Sunless Citadel and found this awesome special longsword - Shatterspike - so I had to take Imp Sunder for it to function fully. That's when the rest of the players began to chuckle and ask if I was really attached to being LG...

May I ask just what you had done for them to ask such a question, or was this just the typical 'you are a paladin and must therefor fall!' BS that seems to happen all the time in every game but the ones I play in?

[Jeran Korak]

I remember when I played Neverwinter Nights, and my first serious character build was Fighter 10, Weapon Master 30. It was okay, but since it was made on a server where high magic items balanced out melee characters versus mages, I got hilariously stomped on when I tried applying it to other servers. For quite a long time I was baffled by the Vancian magic system of D&D, so I stuck to fighters and barbarians. Now I primarily roleplay spellcasters, and can't say I've ever looked back.

Furthermore, I was once obsessed with some kind of sorcerer/fighter hybrid that, to put it bluntly, sucked. Not that it stopped me trying to get it working for about six months worth of roleplaying sessions.

[Troacctid]

May I ask just what you had done for them to ask such a question, or was this just the typical 'you are a paladin and must therefor fall!' BS that seems to happen all the time in every game but the ones I play in?

Those are the prerequisite feats to become a Blackguard.

[RolkFlameraven]

Those are the prerequisite feats to become a Blackguard.

Oh! Wow, he would need some ranks in hide still but heh. I guess that tells you how often I've ever played a Blackguard eh?

[frogglesmash]

I made a monk, and my ultimate ability was going to be whirlwind attack.

[Flame of Anor]

I specialized in evocation.

I considered becoming an Arcane Archer.

I played a monk.

I spent my cleric's feats on warhammer proficiency.

I'm sorry.

[squiggit]

My second character ever was a human sorcerer.

I made fun of the party wizard for playing a wizard because they were worse than sorcerers. Incidentally I thought the ONLY reason anyone would ever play a wizard over a sorcerer was for the extra skill points from int.

And then I prepared magic missile in every slot. I cast them all in the first combat and then convinced the party to find a place to sleep for the night so I could do the same thing next combat.

[Sliver]

My first character... I joined a game on an online chat and made the character on some site that had the core options there. No knowledge regarding the rules, never encountering the PHB...

Elven Sorcerer, low Con. It gets worse. Spells: Magic Missile + Mage Armor. Worse? Never used Mage Armor because I didn't want to waste spell slots that could be used to deal damage.

I didn't even know about casting defensively or 5ft steps...

Went unconscious after nearly ever fight. All but the first, really. Died shortly after reaching level 2. Replaced with a dwarven fighter, though I don't remember his feat selection.

[Marlowe]

My VERY first 3.0 character was a Human Generalist wizard called Ivy Comedo-Harkkonen (the DM was responsible for the "Comedo". I'm fully to blame for the "Harkkonen". AKA "Creeping Ivy".

She had worse stats than Elite array, although being a wizard this hardly mattered. She had Weapon Proficiency 9Scimitar) and Weapon Finesse (Scimitar). I cannot honestly remember if this was legal or we just made a mistake. This was the very early days of 3rd edition. Nothing but core existed, and we were playing the game based on short glimpses of the one copy of the rulebook available through the university RP club.

I remember quite distinctly she was actually tolerably effective. Usual Combo was Mage Armour at first sign of trouble, followed by sniping with light crossbow (in the case of heavy opposition) or Sleep (if there was a chance of that taking out all the opposition). I remember she swung the scimitar in combat exactly once. If things looked hairy we were quite prepared to run like hell.

First 3.5 Character was a blaster sorceress called Martina. She had Ex Weapon Prof. (Spiked Chain) for no good reason and most of the rest of her feats were about buffing her Spellcraft check, owing to a houserule the DM had about spellcraft checks being required to cast spells. She was supposed to be an expy of a certain character with the same name from "Slayers Next". Spoilt, selfish, and histrionic. Unfortunately at least two others in the party turned out to be way dumber than any anime character so she actually wound up being one of the sane ones, because going "Full Martina" would just have led to the party being a complete mess.

Again, she was actually fairly effective. Her biggest failing in retrospect was in spell selection rather than anything else--too much elemental blasting and not enough battlefield control.

I remember distinctly refusing to take any Polymorph-type spells because of her personal vanity, which was not only a handicap but meant I hadn't understood the inspirational character very well.

[atemu1234]

"Slayers Next"

Not getting the reference. Please explain. Explain! EXPLAIN!!

[Marlowe]

Martina Navritolova Mel Zoana is a supporting character from a 1996(?) Anime series. She is a princess of the Kingdom of Zoana who gets her kingdom destroyed by the proverbially destructive "hero" Lina Inverse in the first episode.
http://www.angelfire.com/realm/phoenixfire/images/slayers/martina2.gif After this, she swears revenge on Lina and stalks her for most of the rest of the series. Her defining traits are dressing like an idiot (even by Slayers standards), laughing like a loon, worshipping an evil god that she invented herself and seeing absolutely no problem with this idea, crushing on every single male character she meets, gloating about her cunning and beauty at the top of her lungs and being both completely inept at hindering the protagonists while being apparently almost completely unkillable herself.

Her delusions of Archvillainy are so intense she is occasionally able to induce supernatural events through the power of sheer obsession. Apparently makes the cash to finance her "evil schemes" by working as a waitress or by making and selling origami flowers between episodes. After a while the heroes just kind of give up and let her tag along for whatever good she is. Was the subject of one of Lina's best and most characteristic lines:

"Everybody! Use Martina as a shield and Run".

She survives the series and gets married. Lina acidly comments that she only made it because she's a comic relief character, to which she is criticised for breaking the fourth wall.

EDIT: Yes, she is named after the Tennis player. Yes, there is a tennis episode where she is the major antagonist. No, the real Tennis player was not aware of this until quite recently.

[(Un)Inspired]

Ok, super confession time:

The first time I got to actually play a 3rd editionish game it was for a one shot (that I had grandiose dream of continuing to level 20... Somehow...) and I made a monk because REAL(tm) badasses don't need weapons or spell component pounces or ANYTHING to whup ass.

I rember flirting against the "Boss" of the lvl 1 one shot and having trouble hitting and being vaguely upset as the beginnings of rules comprehension awoke in my brain.

[Marlowe]

I rember flirting against the "Boss" of the lvl 1 one shot and having trouble hitting

Flowers. You should have bought flowers. And played a Bard.

I must admit, seducing the villain is something I've never tried, so nice one anyway.

[(Un)Inspired]

euhhhhhhhh...
That should have said flurrying...

Oh well, the anecdote still carries it's message

[turbo164]

It's ok, Monks lose their Flirting penalty at level 9! :smallwink:

[Sheogoroth]

From Pathfinder.

White-haired Witch animates your hair and gives you the equivalent of a 3rd arm that uses your intelligence as strength.
The idea was to combine it with Gunslinger and reload SUPER fast via mustache.

[Bad Wolf]

From Pathfinder.

White-haired Witch animates your hair and gives you the equivalent of a 3rd arm that uses your intelligence as strength.
The idea was to combine it with Gunslinger and reload SUPER fast via mustache.

Don't see a problem here.

[Flame of Anor]

VoP + Monk.

Why is that specifically bad? I mean, obviously no combo with Monk is likely to be good, but are there items that make Monks significantly more playable?

[OldTrees1]

Why is that specifically bad? I mean, obviously no combo with Monk is likely to be good, but are there items that make Monks significantly more playable?

Yes. Items can let a monk reach that flying dragon that has been strafing them.

[Curmudgeon]

Why is that specifically bad? I mean, obviously no combo with Monk is likely to be good, but are there items that make Monks significantly more playable?
A Monk with money can buy a Sparring Dummy of the Master and train with it to be able to take 10' steps whenever they would normally be allowed to take 5' steps. (And sell it back for half price after the training is finished.) A Lawful Evil Monk can buy a Feathered Wings graft and have nonmagical flight (at 2x their enhanced land speed) forever after. Any Monk would do well with a Necklace of Natural Attacks (http://archive.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/fc/20060707a) to give their unarmed attack the same enhancements usually added to manufactured weapons. And, of course, Monks with money can buy all those Manuals (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/magicItems/wondrousItems.htm#manualofBodilyHealth) and Tomes (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/magicItems/wondrousItems.htm#tomeofClearThought) for up to +5 inherent boost to abilities.

[AvatarVecna]

Why is that specifically bad? I mean, obviously no combo with Monk is likely to be good, but are there items that make Monks significantly more playable?

Monks with optimized ACFs, feats, combos, multiclass dips, martial manuevers, spells, and magic items can be pretty decent; VoP requires Exalted Good (which cuts you off from Evil options) and specifically forbids magic items. Anything you need to do that you don't get from VoP or Monk is off the table: flight, teleportation, miss chance, multiple attacks as a standard action or on a charge, breaking the action economy, etc.

A VoP Monk 20 can run really fast and jump really far. They can't fly, they can't climb/swim too well (not enough SP), they can't teleport (except 1/day Dimension Door at the higher levels), and they can't cross planar boundaries.

A VoP Monk 20 has lots of attacks with a large damage die. Their attack bonus isn't high enough to hit with most of those attacks, their damage bonus isn't anything particularly impressive, TWF gets just as many attacks with more easily enchanted/optimized weapons, they can't make more than 1 attack on a charge or standard action, and they have no AoE options.

A VoP Monk 20 has an ungodly AC and saves. Their saves would be higher with items, they don't have any source of miss-chance (displacement, blinking, mirror image, whatever), they can't no-sell any attacks per round at all, they don't have a way of giving themselves cover other than hiding behind a nearby object, and they only have a rather piddly list of immunities that doesn't even make them immune to the more common and lethal conditions.

A VoP Monk 20 high Dex and Wis, with Listen, Spot, Move Silently, Hide, Climb, and Swim on their skill list. Too bad they don't get enough skill points to max all of them to be the ultimate scout; too bad several spells, powers, and super-senses make hiding useless; too bad they can't afford to spend a feat on Darkstalker or Keen-Eared Scout without ruining their combat capabilities even further.

EDIT: I'm currently competing in the Zinc Saucier: Battle Dancer round (that chaotic monk from Dragon Compendium that's actually fairly decent). Three of the four builds use VoP; one is a Nymph Monk/Sacred Fist using spells and Nymph abilities to pretend to be a battle dancer; another is a Catfolk Bard/Unarmed Swordsage/Sublime Chord/Jade Pheonix Mage using spells and manuevers to do the same. Both of these unarmed builds are very good at unarmed combat, despite their Vow of Poverty...and it's almost entirely because they use spells to cheat their Exalted asses off.

[Telonius]

VoP + Monk.

Mine was VoP+Monk+Lesser Drow+Tattooed Monk. It was ... well, interesting. He was very good at not dying, which came in handy as the Rogue's flanking partner; and he actually turned out to be the Party Face.

[ExLibrisMortis]

My ideal build was - at first - a straight fighter 20 with Slashing Flurry and Weapon Supremacy, using a wounding speed weapon. Because 6 attacks per round (at +20/+25/+20/+15/+10/+5, because Weapon Supremacy can get you over +20 if you get extra attacks!) with 1 point of con damage each is pretty elegant, right?

I still like wounding weapons, and those feats (not that I'd pick them unless prereqs were waived), but fighter... not so much.

[J-H]

My first character in NWN was Monk 1/Cleric 1/Ranger 1 to start with. I got WIS to AC, 1st-level spellcasting early, and I'd still get an animal companion and dual wielding!

Yeah, BAB +1 on a martial character at level 3. No animal companion until level...8? The summoned dire badger (Summon 1) was pretty meh pretty fast, too.

And yet, the game was still beatable. NWN was all about trading hit point damage while drinking healing potions that your enemies don't have access to.

[IronicGentleman]

This: http://www.myth-weavers.com/sheet.html#id=143845

I hadn't even finished the sheet when I realised my mistake. Mistake 1: Gave up manifester levels. Mistake 2: It was a crit fisher.

I almost want to pick it up again and see what I can do with it ... :smallamused:

[Necroticplague]

Wasn't from an actual tabletop game, but is was DnD, so I'll put it here.

My first exposure to 3.x was from a video game on the PsP called Dungeon and Dragons: Tactics. From it, I actually learned some of the lessons of optimization before every playing the actual game (battlefield control>blasting, rest after every combat, THF>TWF, monks are useless, the best defense is all your enemies lying dead before you). Since I Had a whole party to play with, I got to go through several horrible ideas at once. Experiments include:

1.Monk who dual-wielded nunchucks. I don't think I remember her FoB ever hitting anyone. Only time she did anything useful was a side effect of poor coding on Spring Attack (basically, let you move and attack as a free action once per turn[incidentally, spring attack would be totally worth it if that's what it actually did])
2.AC-Focused Psiwar. Sword and board, bunch of AC boosting magic items and powers. Didn't know about the stacking rules, wasn't even aware there was any kind of limit until I went 'wait, why is my AC going down when I manifest Inertial Armor'? (The correct answer was 'a combination of poor coding and the stacking rules). Used Thick Hide, Inertial Armor, wore two rings of Deflection and an Amulet of Natural Armor. For some reason, used a Buckler despite wielding a Longsword
3.Blaster sorceror. Played second fiddle to the Battle Control Wizard (who would entangle, black tentacles, cloud kill, acid cloud, cinder cloud, then but up her feet and drink lemonade until all the enemies died)

[gooddragon1]

Timestop+Delayed Blast Fireballs.

That's a lot of high level spell slots for damage. I learned later that thinking with your spell slots is the wrong way to play a high level caster.

[IcarusWulfe]

My first character was a LG Elf Evoker who would do nothing but spam Magic Missile and Flaming Sphere. He would also attempt to attack monsters in close combat with a short sword. I don't even know what my thought process was at that time. I also only had 14INT

[Marlowe]

That's two of us so-far that have spoken of playing a Wizard with "only" a 14-15 intelligence as though that's somehow a mistake. When in reality it makes precious little difference. Especially at low levels. Especially if you focus on things that don't depend on save DCs.

I think I roughed out some maths once with a 1st level Fighter with STR 18 vs one with 15, and worked out the strong guy would be doing 50% more damage on average, which is kind of significant.

When I did the same thing with Wizards and INT it came out that the smarter guy would have enemies fail their saves about 12.5% more often, which is helpful but significantly less of a performance differential. And of course if the Wizards are focusing on effects that don't dish out save DCs there's no difference at all.

[Renen]

My 1st character (like ever) was a sorcerer/malconvoker.
It was a pretty good build and everything... and our DM even gave us 2 LA discount on any templates. What I should have NOT done was pick half-celestial as a template...

[Bad Wolf]

My 1st character (like ever) was a sorcerer/malconvoker.
It was a pretty good build and everything... and our DM even gave us 2 LA discount on any templates. What I should have NOT done was pick half-celestial as a template...

Should've picked Half-Fey.

[bekeleven]

With Use Magic Device and a wand at CL 20, that would be 2 charges daily costing 1,800 gp for +5 to 2 weapons. For the cost of 27.78 days of temporary boosts to 2 weapons, you can get a permanent +5 enhancement on 1 weapon instead. The permanent enhancement is much more robust, because it won't disappear on a targeted Dispel Magic.
Assuming your encounter rates are by the book, that's enough time to get 6.25 levels.

----

My first character was a fighter. I knew I was going to get hit a lot. Toughness was a feat for 3 hit points... but Endurance into Diehard is two feats for 10 hit points! (basically.) So those were my first feats.

Then I took power attack. To increase my damage? I dunno, I'd just miss more so that wouldn't really help, would it? No, I took it to unlock the best feat ever, cleave! Extra attacks for free!

For reference, I rolled (in front of the group) 18 17 16 15 14 13 for stats on this character. I ended up putting them down in order.

[bean illus]

I can remember that it took a while before i realized that Cleric 7/Sorc7/Druid6 was not a good idea.

I can remember thinking that metamagic feats were not worth the cost.

I can remember thinking Human Martial Rouge2/Monk2/Fighter2 was a valid martial stem (wait, that one still looks cool (but too MAD)).

16 14 10 14 14 10

[paperarmor]

Human Skillmonkey Rogue that tried to use feinting in combat. Had, a dope Hand Crossbow though.

[OldTrees1]

Human Skillmonkey Rogue that tried to use feinting in combat. Had, a dope Hand Crossbow though.

What was/is embarrassing about that? That can be quite a versatile character.

[paperarmor]

What was/is embarrassing about that? That can be quite a versatile character.

The DM didn't give XP for non combat encounters, and was oddly spiteful when I beat challenges like traps, and the other players kind of guilted me about my characters lack of combat ability.

[Curmudgeon]

What was/is embarrassing about that? That can be quite a versatile character.
Feinting requires special build effort, because

All the ranks in Bluff you had to buy are automatically opposed by the enemy's BAB and any skill they have in Sense Motive. Basically, any creature build with a bit of Sense Motive isn't going to be feintable.
Feinting is normally a standard action, which precludes making any attacks until the next round.

A straight Rogue isn't ever going to be better than average at feinting. A Rogue/Invisible Blade could be good.

[Pex]

Power Attack + Two Weapon Fighting: The cumulative penalties to hit just meant not hitting at all.

Playing a cleric and taking Lightning Reflexes: Unlike many here I actually like the +2 to a saving throw feats and still do. However, taking this feat to improve a poor saving throw where I take half damage anyway even if I make the save was a complete waste of a feat resource. I don't remember what the character's Dex was, but it was no higher than 14 if that, not that the feat made a difference.

[OldTrees1]

The DM didn't give XP for non combat encounters, and was oddly spiteful when I beat challenges like traps, and the other players kind of guilted me about my characters lack of combat ability.

Ouch. OUCH! Ouch! No wonder the skillmonkey felt embarrassing, although I think that is their fault and not your choice of character.

[paperarmor]

Ouch. OUCH! Ouch! No wonder the skillmonkey felt embarrassing, although I think that is their fault and not your choice of character.

Yeah, I loved the cocky little dude. I even updated him to be able fight.

My first sorcerer however was objectively awful as he focused on fire spells and had no Searing Spell

[Telok]

My first character was back in early AD&D. We rolled 4d6 for stats and if you rolled all four as sixes you got a 19. Through pure beginners luck I got a 19 in strength and 9s and 10s in everything else. So I played a ranger with a halberd, because halberds had the biggest damage of all the melee weapons. And I had a horse. The psionics book had just come out so the other four people in the party were psychics, I had to something else because the DM didn't want a party of all psychics.

By the end of the first session I was in jail for a year after breaking down a door for my companions, the horse was horribly wounded and I wasn't allowed to put it out of it's misery or sell it or I'd lose all my ranger class features, and then I did lose the ranger features because I couldn't protect the horse and the rest of the party sold it to a glue maker.

[Jurai]

EDIT: I'm currently competing in the Zinc Saucier: Battle Dancer round (that chaotic monk from Dragon Compendium that's actually fairly decent). Three of the four builds use VoP; one is a Nymph Monk/Sacred Fist using spells and Nymph abilities to pretend to be a battle dancer; another is a Catfolk Bard/Unarmed Swordsage/Sublime Chord/Jade Pheonix Mage using spells and manuevers to do the same. Both of these unarmed builds are very good at unarmed combat, despite their Vow of Poverty...and it's almost entirely because they use spells to cheat their Exalted asses off.

Excuse me, sir, but even if those builds didn't have VoPov, they'd still be cheating their jacks and jennies off with spells. You make it sound as though they have to cheat.