[3.5] Arcane Duelist Build

[Thurbane]

So..the Arcane Duelist (http://archive.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/re/20030224a) PrC.

It's kind of interesting, but suffers greatly from being a gish class with poor BAB. So just for giggles, I've been thinking on how to get a build to BAB +16 by level 20 that uses all 10 AD levels.

So far I've been tinkering with this build (I may use it for an NPC at some point): Swashbuckler 1/Fighter 1/Hexblade 4/Paladin (Slaughter or Tyranny) 2/Arcane Duelist 2/Legacy Champion 10.

Swashbucker for Arcane Duelist skills, Fighter to grab one of the feats required for AD, Hexblade 4 for arcane casting, Paladin for Charisma to saves, and finally Legacy Champion to progress AD and still hit BAB +16 by 20.

Far from an optimal build, but it does have a few nice things: Cha bonus to saves (twice, against spells and SLAs), Cha bonus to AC, Mettle, and a few others...

Any way this build can be improved, while still hitting BAB +16 and getting all of the Arcane Duelists class features?

Cheers - T

[Snowbluff]

I've considered trying it with Legacy Champion. That might give some wiggle room in the BAB department, but I haven't parsed it out.

[Waker]

SIt's kind of interesting, but suffers greatly from being a gish class with poor BAB. So just for giggles, I've been thinking on how to get a build to BAB +16 by level 20 that uses all 10 AD levels.
No, you see the class just merely creates the idea that it's a Gish. Very meta.
I would probably swap out the Paladin levels for Crusader. While the Divine Grace for a Paladin is better than the Crusader's Indomitable Soul, the maneuvers you would gain would probably help your lack of combat abilities.

[Snowbluff]

If you want to enhance the gish illusion, you can play a drow or half drow and use the sla feats in drow of the underdark.

[Grod_The_Giant]

A weird note: As far as I can tell, there's nothing to stop you from using a two-handed weapon as your Chosen Weapon. Meaning you can use a two-handed weapon with Dextrous Attack. Meaning that you can combine it with Power Attack. Meaning you can combine the +2 damage/-1 attack with +1 attack/-1 damage up to the normal cap. Meaning you can effectively reduce your Power Attack multiplier by 1 to remove the accuracy penalty altogether. Thus, I suggest trying to fit a level of Barbarian and Leap Attack into your build. (You can replace the Swashbuckler level easily enough; Skilled City Dweller lets you swap any of the classes' Ride for Tumble, and Harmonious Knight sub levels let you get Perform as a paladin. Or Guardians of Rusheme associations, as per City of Stormreach, apparently)

[Fouredged Sword]

There is an interesting thing I would want to do with this class. I think, with a two handed weapon you can deal a very consistent and fairly high amount of damage using dexterous attack. You are not going to be an Uber Charger, but taking a great ax and trading 11 damage for +11 to hit, then trading the 11 to hit for 22 damage seems a good deal. The bonus you get from weapon enhancement counts 4 times higher, as you trade the +1 to damage for +1 to hit and then trade both of those +1 to hits for more damage.

The problem is horrible BAB. With that, I am tempted to go Duskblade 6 (or duskblade 3/ SA hit and run fighter 1 / barbarian 2 for pounce) / Arcane Dulist 1 / Uncanny Trickster 3 / Legacy champion 10.

Now, the idea is that while you CAN stick to light weapons, you WANT to pick the biggest two handed monster of a weapon you can. I'm thinking strongarm bracers and a goliath greathammer. You are using Dexterous Attack to max out your power attack every single attack and give you enough attack bonus to never miss.

Depending on how you read dexterous attack you may be able to roll dexterous attack into power attack into dexterous attack for each of your itteratives, so they do less damage rather than being less accurate.

For example, at level 20 you have 15/10/5 bab, so you are going to power attack for 15 points. Now, that means you want to add back in 15 points of attack bonus. So you do 15 extra damage. Now your second iterative is at -5 accuracy, so apply another -5 damage +5 to hit for 10 extra damage. Your final attack will be at the same to hit bonus as your first, but now only deals 5 points of extra damage. The thing is that you still don't dip into your actual weapon damage and any bonuses you have on top of that.

The idea would be to get into position to do a flanking full attack and deliver a craven fueled damage blitz of attacks that actually connect and deal good damage numbers. You want a +1 defending weapon and for the cleric to GMW it for large defense and offense bonuses. You also make good use of weapon crystals, as you can use them on weapons with lower enhancements than normal.

[Thurbane]

OK "gish" was a bad choice of terms. Lets just say it's a class I'm interested in.

Good advice so far.

[daremetoidareyo]

you can get mirror image for one round at a time 1+int modifier times per day from the swashbuckler arcane stunt ACF in complete mage page 32. All you have to have is one rank in knowledge arcana and you lose nothing.

[Fouredged Sword]

This class should ether be a full bab class OR be a 3/4 bab class with half casting.

You are a master of a blade who uses his weapon to embarrass his foes. Cool, how good is he with a sword? Meh, so so. Slightly better than the wizard.

[Thurbane]

This class should ether be a full bab class OR be a 3/4 bab class with half casting.

You are a master of a blade who uses his weapon to embarrass his foes. Cool, how good is he with a sword? Meh, so so. Slightly better than the wizard.

Agreed - if it was house ruled to be 3/4 BAB or full BAB, and (partially) progressed casting, would be a whole lot more appealing. Maybe to bring it in line with something like the Swiftblade, full BAB and 6/10 casting? (or more than 6/10, since Swiftblade has better features).

As it is, Arcane Duelist is OK-ish for a 2 level dip (Cha to AC at the cost of 1 BAB).

[Waker]

As it is, Arcane Duelist is OK-ish for a 2 level dip (Cha to AC at the cost of 1 BAB).
For a low-op group, maybe. Dodge+Mobility and 5 ranks in Perform? I mean, I know that the feats are used as prereqs for everyone, but they are still crappy.

[Grod_The_Giant]

This class should ether be a full bab class OR be a 3/4 bab class with half casting.

You are a master of a blade who uses his weapon to embarrass his foes. Cool, how good is he with a sword? Meh, so so. Slightly better than the wizard.
It's baffling, because it looks so much like an Arcane Archer knockoff. I can only assume that it was hastily thrown together for the article and... I dunno, the author forgot to change the BAB on the class template? A shame; with a full BAB it would actually be pretty neat. Cha to AC, +4 enhancement on weapon attacks, Blur up to 10/day, Mirror Image at will, and that funky-but-awesome Haste/Mirror Image capstone.

[Biffoniacus_Furiou]

Even on a gestalt character, you'll be losing either spellcasting or BAB for taking it, so you really only want two or four levels of it.

Two levels for Cha to AC. Three levels because Dexterous Attack has some funny interaction with two-handed Power Attack. The fourth level for an extra +1 on your weapon in addition to any other enhancement bonus it has is worth getting since that level doesn't lose BAB. So you can Greater Magic Weapon that to +5, and it counts as +7 as long as you don't have more than +3 worth of other magic weapon abilities added to it, since it can't go over +10 total.

[Fouredged Sword]

I could see it as half of a duskblade // paladin 2 / marshal 2 / something 2/ arcane duelist 10 gestalt build.

[Snowbluff]

Agreed - if it was house ruled to be 3/4 BAB or full BAB, and (partially) progressed casting, would be a whole lot more appealing. Maybe to bring it in line with something like the Swiftblade, full BAB and 6/10 casting? (or more than 6/10, since Swiftblade has better features).


Indeed it would be pretty interesting. I do wish I had more of a reason to use Arcane Duelist.

[Fouredged Sword]

Also worth noting. The cha to ac is not armor locked. You get it even in full plate. Isn't there a paladin acf that let you cast wizard spells or some such? Getting cha to ac would be a good dip for such a character. Perhaps on a bardadin, though it would slightly slow your inspire advancement.

[barakaka]

Frenzied Berserker 10 for the Power Attack bonus which could be nice with Dexterous Attack rather than doing the Shocktrooper style. Considering at high levels, nearly everyone can prevent you from charging. Doesn't really go with the flavour though.

[Fouredged Sword]

Perhaps a wood elf barbarian build with a splash of trickster spellthief for skills and spells.

Barbarian (whirlpounce) 4 / trickster spellthief 1 / Wildrunner 2 / Arcane Duelist 3 / Frenzied Berserker 10

Here you have a character who can slap together 3 versions of rage and power attack like nobody's business. Arcane Duelist in this case is trades the Wildrunner hide in plain sight for dexterous attack and cha to AC. Considering that when this build throws down whirling frenzy, frenzy AND primal scream it ends up with +12 to strength and +6 to dex.

[ExLibrisMortis]

Also worth noting. The cha to ac is not armor locked. You get it even in full plate. Isn't there a paladin acf that let you cast wizard spells or some such? Getting cha to ac would be a good dip for such a character. Perhaps on a bardadin, though it would slightly slow your inspire advancement.
Hmm, good point. You might be able to do a Mystic Fire Knight paladin with Sword of the Arcane Order to enter Arcane Duelist and then Spelldancer and Swiftblade (obviously, the sorcadin/bardadin variant is more powerful, but that's not the point). Trouble is, you don't get haste until level 11, so you'd never hit Swiftblade 9 pre-epic, and I don't think you have the feats to get heightening shenanigans going... although Aeshkrau with Improved Krau Sigil is not bad in any case.

Let's try this. It's not going to be elegant due to feat constraints, but whatever.

Illumian paladin 8/arcane duelist 2/spelldancer 1/swiftblade 9.
Dodgeflaw
Combat Castingflaw
Improved Krau Sigil1
Extend Spell3
Sword of the Arcane Order6
Extra Slot9 - get yourself a bonus third-level slot, use it to cast haste.
Persistent Spell12

Sanctum Spellmetamagic storm - get this before level 11
Endurancesandals
Mobilityarmour

Feats at 15 and 18 are open.

So... you have 18 base attack, casting as a paladin 9 (with CL 6), with the best haste you're ever going to get, and--just for fun--CHA to AC in heavy armour. Swiftblade doesn't advance your paladin casting any further, it just improves your haste. Not worth it considering the feat cost, but not at all a bad concept, I think. If you're in a game where feat taxes are reduced (Dodge + Mobility into one feat, Combat Casting + Endurance into one feat), and SotAO allows Swiftblade to progress paladin casting, it might actually be a nice mid-power build, using high-OP stuff (extra actions, persistomancy) to relatively harmless effect.

[Fouredged Sword]

I would go with SotAO paladin 9 / Abjurant Champion 5 / Arcane Duelist 3 / Uncanny trickster 3

IF your Dm is permissive and let's abjurant champion progress paladin spellcasting with SotAO, you get cha to saves, cha to AC in full plate, 4th level paladin spells that all abjurations are quickened for free, your itterative attacks actually all hit (at reduced damage) and +16 bab.

Could be fun for a cha focused melee attacker. You would go Str>Cha>Con>Wis>Dex>Int.

[ExLibrisMortis]

I would go with SotAO paladin 9 / Abjurant Champion 5 / Arcane Duelist 3 / Uncanny trickster 3

IF your Dm is permissive and let's abjurant champion progress paladin spellcasting with SotAO, you get cha to saves, cha to AC in full plate, 4th level paladin spells that all abjurations are quickened for free, your itterative attacks actually all hit (at reduced damage) and +16 bab.

Could be fun for a cha focused melee attacker. You would go Str>Cha>Con>Wis>Dex>Int.
Thing is, if you have Abjurant Champion, why do you still need heavy armour? It doesn't stack with luminous armour.

[Fouredged Sword]

Thing is, if you have Abjurant Champion, why do you still need heavy armour? It doesn't stack with luminous armour.

The idea would be to not rely on luminous armor but instead actually use shield and protection from evil. +5 full plate is a nice +13 to AC, and if you want to layer luminous armor on top the penalty to melee attackers DOES stack. GLA is an option, but that's one of your rare 4th level spells and provides only +2 more AC, and that is only in the very late game of 20th level. Most of the game it will be matching (discounting the penalty to melee attackers that LA provides). Meanwhile your shield spell grants +11 and protection from evil grants +9. Getting more than +33 to ac is a little pointless unless you are facing a crazy DM.