Drow gestalt help!

[Roninblack]

So my Gm has decided to run a drow gestalt campaign focusing pretty heavily on politics. We've even been given a template that provides a bonus to hide, move silent, and gives us HiPS.
Now we're starting at level 4 halfway to 5 and the drow LA was bought off before we started. I was wanting to do something I've never done before and so I said I'm gonna use XPH and ToB.
My research on the boards said i should go psion//warblade, or maybe psion//factotum if avoiding ToB. But I've run into to many choices. I was thinking shaper sounded cool, but we're going to be in medium tunnels for the most part. And we get riding lizards so i thought charger might be fun, but ride is cross class.
We're doing attributes as starting with all 8's adding 1 for 1 points with a non racial cap of 18, and a minimum of 12 in charisma, with 48 points to distribute as we see fit.

My question is how would you go about building this? What choices do you think are the best? I'm planning on going into thrallherd at 6 if that helps!

[Biffoniacus_Furiou]

Given that he's making everyone sneaky, I'd say you'll probably want to go with a build that can do stealth. I'd go with a TWF build that can sneak attack, mixing in Psion means Psychic Assassin (http://archive.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/psm/20040723d) should be on the table, its Mind Cripple ability can automatically disable an enemy in a single full attack.

Consider the Psion alternate class features for each discipline (part 1 (http://archive.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/psm/20070314a), part 2 (http://archive.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/psm/20070411a)). Shaper can get Personal Construct which is extremely useful for flanking and some utility, Telepath can get Telepathy which allows you to take Mindsight, Egoist can get a Changeling's disguise ability plus party-healing powers. If going Psychic Assassin you should go with Telepath and get telepathy at Psion 5, and pick up Mindsight at 6th, so you can see the Int score of each opponent and you'll know who you can take out quickly with Mind Cripple.

Drow get Dex +2, Con -2, Int +2, Cha +2, and the system you're using for ability scores looks generous, so I'd go Str 10, Dex 20, Con 16, Int 20, Wis 18, Cha 16 after race adjustments. I'd go with the following build:

1. Psion 1// Swordsage 1
2. Psion 2// Spellthief 1
3. Psion 3// Swashbuckler 1
4. Psion 4// Swordsage 2
5. Psion 5// Fast Movement Ranger (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/variant/classes/variantCharacterClasses.htm#ranger) 1
6. Psion 6// Psychic Assassin 1
7. Swordsage 3// Psychic Assassin 2
8. Psion 7// Psychic Assassin 3
9. Swordsage 4// Psychic Assassin 4
10. Swordsage 5// Psychic Assassin 5
11. Psion 8// Thrallherd 1
12. Swordsage 6// Thrallherd 2
13. Swordsage 7// Thrallherd 3
14. Swordsage 8// Thrallherd 4
15. Swordsage 9// Thrallherd 5
16. Swordsage 10// Thrallherd 6
17. Swordsage 11// Thrallherd 7
18. Swordsage 12// Thrallherd 8
19. Swordsage 13// Thrallherd 9
20. Psion 9// Thrallherd 10

Keep in mind that Psychic Assassin 5 advances your manifesting per the text description, which always takes precedent over a table when they disagree according to the primary source rules in the core rulebook errata.

Also note that taking Swordsage at 1st level gives you x6 starting skill points instead of the standard x4 as it's currently written, but your DM may disregard that. If you can't benefit from that, consider moving the levels around to put Fast Movement Ranger at 1st for skill points and BAB.

The Spellthief level enables you to use wands of any Wizard spells of the schools that class can access, namely Wraithstrike which is still a swift action to use on a wand per the Rules Compendium. The Ranger level also enables you to use wands of Ranger spells, there are plenty of strong choices.

Get TWF and Gloves of the Balanced Hand, along with Shadow Blade, Darkstalker, Mindsight, Craven, Adaptive Style, and whatever else you think you'll need. You'll want to use two Shortswords, and with Weapon Finesse from Swashbuckler and Shadow Blade you'll use Dex for attack and damage rolls. You'll add your Wis bonus to your AC wearing light armor but not when unarmored, Races of the Wild has a list of armors with some that have very high max Dex bonuses, and you can still use Inertial Armor and use that bonus instead of the bonus your armor grants. Wear a Ring of the Darkhidden from Drow of the Underdark.

Get a psicrystal (coward, friendly, liar, or nimble) and keep it in a compartment on your person so opponents will never have line of sight/effect to it and cannot target it directly or hit it with area effects. Give it a Healing Belt and it can use that to heal you during combat when needed. Keep Share Pain on it so you'll take half damage from all sources, and the half it takes will always be reduced by its Hardness 8. Use Vigor to give yourself a temporary hp cushion and share that with the psicrystal. You can use Body Adjustment to heal both yourself and your psicrystal with each use.

Wear a small bone or wooden pendant on a cord or light chain around your neck, apply Unguent of Timelessness (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/magicItems/wondrousItems.htm#unguentofTimelessness) to the pendant. Use your Darkness spell-like ability on that and it will last 365 times longer, about 60 hours per level. You could also say you hired an NPC spellcaster (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/equipment/goodsAndServices.htm#spell) to put Extended Deeper Darkness (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/deeperDarkness.htm) heightened to ~5th level at a caster level 20th on that. It would have cost 1200 gp heightened to 5th, it lasts 40 days normally but on the timeless pendant it lasts 40 years instead. Since it's heightened to a 5th level spell it will overpower any light spell of 4th level or lower, it equally cancels a 5th level light spell, and a 6th level or higher light spell can overpower its effect as long as they're overlapping. You can tuck the pendant under your shirt to block the darkness effect when you don't need it, you can also hold it in your mouth to accomplish that and 'drop' it as a free action by spitting it out to plunge the room into darkness when needed.

For maneuvers and stances, start out with Wolf Fang Strike, Sudden Leap, Hunter's Sense, Island of Blades, Shadow Jaunt, and whatever else looks good. You'll be trading out low level maneuvers for higher level ones at every eve-numbered Swordsage level starting at 4th, but the ones I listed should stay useful throughout your career.

[mabriss lethe]

Don't worry too much about ride being a cross-class skill. It's easy to boost your ride check to a decent degree with only minimal skill point investment.

If you went with Psion//Factotum, you'd also have the requisite class skills for the Vermin Trainer feat, which is just plain fun. (applying the warbeast template to your multi-legged minions is good for both the boost the template gives and the price tag it attaches to the value of the creature, useful for figuring out which ones are within your WBL.) I'm fond of boosting vermin minions with Draconic Auras, going with that option might make starting as a Deepwyrm Drow an attractive option. (basically the same but with slightly different SLAs and the Dragonblooded subtype)

[Roninblack]

[QUOTE=mabriss lethe;22964263] might make starting as a Deepwyrm Drow an attractive option.

Definitely running this one past my dm, all sorts of fun stuff i might be able to do with a dragon subtype!

out of curiosity, is the skill points the only reason you favor sword sage over war blade? i really need the skill points, but i'm struggling to give up that d12 hd

[Nifft]

I'm planning on going into thrallherd at 6 if that helps! Thrallherd is awesome. Good choice.

To get into Thrallherd, you need a power that's only on the Telepath discipline list. That means you either need to be a Telepath, or you need to spend a feat to get the power. (The feat to buy is either Expanded Knowledge at level 3 or 5, or Hidden Talent at level 1 -- but the latter is an optional variant rule which isn't XPH default legal.)


Swordsage has some great maneuvers, including the tactical teleportation suite (standard / move / swift). Swordsage also gets Quick to Act (which is a straight-up Initiative bonus, and as a primary caster you like winning Initiative checks).

Warblade also has some great maneuvers, including White Raven Tactics and Iron Heart Surge. Warblade also gets to add Int bonus to all sorts of combat stuff, like Reflex saves and critical hit confirmation rolls.

Both of them get access to Stone Dragon maneuvers (a few good ones, like the "ignore all DR and all hardness" strike), and Diamond Mind maneuvers (lots of good stuff).


IMHO the Warblade is more forgiving, so if this is your first ToB character then I'd nudge you in that direction.

[Roninblack]

I forgot to mention btw, that my DM is heavily nerfing any teleportation in the underdark because of "magical radiation" or something, so swordsages teleport which looks awesome may not work right.
He is giving us a free EWP as well, so i'm leaning towards greathorn minotaur hammer, but i don't know if there's anything more useful out there

[mabriss lethe]

I forgot to mention btw, that my DM is heavily nerfing any teleportation in the underdark because of "magical radiation" or something, so swordsages teleport which looks awesome may not work right.
He is giving us a free EWP as well, so i'm leaning towards greathorn minotaur hammer, but i don't know if there's anything more useful out there
With a free EWP, you definitely want at least some warblade levels, and it really won't matter which EWP you take because you can use the 1st level class ability Weapon Aptitude to have it apply to a different exotic weapon every day. So sure, take the greathorn mintaur hammer. Just remember that at the beginning of the day you can spend an hour to temporarily trade it out for another.

[Nifft]

I forgot to mention btw, that my DM is heavily nerfing any teleportation in the underdark because of "magical radiation" or something, so swordsages teleport which looks awesome may not work right.
He is giving us a free EWP as well, so i'm leaning towards greathorn minotaur hammer, but i don't know if there's anything more useful out there

Spiked chains are pretty spiffy for reach, tripping, and thus battlefield control.

On the one hand, a Swordsage can take a feat to add Dex to damage with all Shadow Hand weapons, and those include Unarmed Strike and Spiked Chain.

On the other hand, a Crusader can use Thicket of Blades to negate Tumble & 5 ft. steps in any square he threatens (via the Thicket of Blades stance), and that's amazing with a Spiked Chain.

On the gripping hand, a Warblade gets IRON HEART SURGE.

[Roninblack]

Thanks for you're help guys! here's what iv'e got, but it isn't finalized if you have any last minute suggestions

Telepath 1 // factotum 1 (house rule class skills stay class skills) psicrystal feat and weapon finesse (house rule'd that finesse does dex to damage too)
telepath 2 // warblade 1
telepath 3 // warblade 2 expanded knowledge astral construct
telepath 4 // warblade 3

Concentration 7, hide 7, move silent 7, psicraft 7, bluff 5, ride 4, handle animal 1, balance 5, know nobility 5, know local 5, craft (sculpting) 4, know psionics 4, know arcana 4, know religion 4, slight of hand 1, UMD 1

gave my psicrystal mindsight

Maneuvers: moment of perfect mind, wolf fang strike, steel wind, steely strike, and wall of blades

Powers: Astral construct, synchronicity, crystal shard, vigor, charm psionic, suggestion psionic, read thoughts, share pain, Detect hostile intent

Went with the elven court blade for 1.5x dex to damage. unguent of timelessness, 4th lvl extended deeper darkness cl ll on a bone pendant with an application of unguent of timelessness on it, headband of intellect +2, waiting for my DM to approve deep crystal on the courtblade. he gave us free armor and weapons btw

[Roninblack]

Hey guys, where'd everybody go?
Anyway i'm still tossing this idea around, and i'm not sure how it's going to look later on. i'm thinking something along the lines of
psion 5, thrallherd 10, psion 5// factotum 1 warblade 19
But i am struggling to balance the extra skills from factotum with giving up warblades capstone. At the same time the only decent warblade prc i could find was eternal blade, which is interesting but i honestly can't say i like the idea of being followed around by some ghost all the time. So i'm not really certain how else to work the progression, does anybody have any other possible suggestions?

[ATHATH]

Just dropping in to state the number one rule of psionics (which you probably already know, but I'm still posting this in case you don't): You CANNOT spend more PP on a power (base cost+augmentations) than your Manifester Level.

You'd be surprised how many people don't know that.

[mabriss lethe]

Also. Consider Factotum 8/warblade. Action surge is worthwhile since extra standard actions would benefit all the moving parts. Psionic powers, martial strikes, factotum SLAs.

[Roninblack]

I've definitely considered factotum 8, but it feels like a bit of a stretch to me. Now i'm really torn about reaching for factotum 3 though with my high int and low strength :smallamused: Isn't there some funky rule about the best time to multi class ToB classes to get stronger powers? can anybody help me out with that?
Edit: maneuvers not powers