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View Full Version : level 6 gnome swordsage advice [3.5 D&D]



Townopolis
2008-10-09, 04:03 AM
So I've decided to play a gnome swordsage in a game I'm joining. A sneaky little "Shadowcraft Sentinel" who's mostly warrior, but taps into the plane of shadow and his natural talent with illusions to give him an edge on the battlefield. The problem is, I have little experience with the class, and I understand it can become a horrible wreckage if handled improperly.

I'm using 32 point buy and your standard rock variety of gnome. I'll be starting with 13k gold for swag.

I know I want to keep his Hide and Move Silently capped, and I know I want to rock the Shadow Hand. Beyond that, I'm uncertain about weapon choice, manuevers, skills, and feats.

Help?

Vizen
2008-10-09, 04:37 AM
Hmm..My favorite class is the Swordsage, but I tend to stick with Desert Wind and dabble a bit in the other stuff for interesting things (Like Dance of the Spider stance) but lets see here...

Shadow hand is all about the stealthy side of things, since its all about the shadows, so you'll find your character should excel in one moment being completely hidden from sight, then all of a sudden the enemy finds itself being Shadow Garroted, and can't figure out where it came from, until you leap out and use a little Shadow Blade Technique on it.

You want maneuvers that help you be sneaky. Dance of the Spider stance will help there, along with Shadow Jaunt (my favorites from Shadow Hand), but you also want maneuvers that deal damage, so pick up Shadow Garrote, and others like that. You may also want to dabble in a little Desert Wind for some extra damaging moves like Fan the Flames, or Tiger Claw for Death From Above, or something damaging like that (Dont have my ToB on me).

For Feats you want stuff that adds that extra little bit to your damage, like Rapid Assault for an extra 1d6 points of damage in the first round of battle.
(As a Swordsage, you'll often find if you start off the round with a heavy-hitting maneuver, that you can deal a TON of damage, or straight out kill an opponent), though if your in a battle for the long haul, you might want to take the feat that allows you to recover all your martial abilities in one full-round action, as otherwise you can become pretty pitiful on the damage side of things.

Of course, that pitiful damage can be overcome if you select feats that allow you to do extra damage, and that can go well with the Discipline Focus class abilities if you make your weapon of choice a weapon from the Shadow Hand path.

As for skills, I think you have the right idea. Hide is the key skill for Shadow Hand. You might also want to look through the abilities you like, and choose the skills that go with them, (Such as making a DC xx tumble check (though thats Desert Wind)) and if you do choose to dabble a little in the other paths, get their key skills too. Though again, I think you have the right idea.

Edit: Since you have 13k gold to spend...For item choices, I would recommend buying things that increase your Wisdom. The Swordsage is pretty much an armoured monk with some neat little extras, so your WIS modifier you'll find starts to be added on to almost everything.

I remember once playing a Swordsage who had 21 initiative, and when we were fighting things, I almost ALWAYS won the rolls. I rolled a natural 20 for initiative against the BBEG (So I had 41 initiative) and the DM even doubled the BBEG's initiative roll and I still beat it to the punch.

Of course, it helps if you have something to back that initiative up with, so as I said, items that increase your WIS will help you out greatly there. DEX and STR are handy to have too, particulary if your engaging the opponent in melee combat a lot (DEX to your AC, STR to your damage), so look for those as well, but only after the WIS part.

Feel free to rip this post apart, I'm going by memory here you see, and my memory is terrible.

Sstoopidtallkid
2008-10-09, 04:55 AM
You can't make a bad ToB character. I'd recommend snagging Wep Finesse and Shadow Blade, going Dex SAD. Pick every Shadow Hand stance, Adaptive Style, go with the Diamond Mind maneuvers instead of saves, snag Extra Readied Maneuver, and make sure you're wielding a Shadow Hand weapon. What level?

Darrin
2008-10-09, 08:49 AM
I'm using 32 point buy and your standard rock variety of gnome.


Stop right there. If you want to be sneaky but aren't going to use a whisper gnome, you will be subject to mockery. Of the merciless variety. Available for free online:

http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/ex/20040807a&page=3



I know I want to keep his Hide and Move Silently capped, and I know I want to rock the Shadow Hand. Beyond that, I'm uncertain about weapon choice, manuevers, skills, and feats.


Ok, the dirty secret of the Shadow Hand discipline is other than the stances, Cloak of Deception, and the three Shadow Jump maneuvers, the strikes are crap. A lot of them depend on fortitude saves to do anything useful, which means you run the risk of completely wasting a standard action. If you're going to sneak up on somebody and whack 'em with a standard strike, you're more likely to get better mileage out of a Diamond Mind or Tiger Claw strike.

Weapon choice: This depends on whether you want to go Shadow Blade + TWF or... ok, I'm a HUGE TWF fan, so just beware that I tend to skew everything that way. I'm not sure what I'd do with a swordsage that didn't use TWF. Start with short swords, then switch to daggers after two levels of Bloodclaw Master (to cancel out the -2 TWF penalty).

Skills: Max out tumble, hide, move silently, and concentration (for Diamond Mind maneuvers). Put some ranks in jump (for Tiger Claw maneuvers). Put at least 5 ranks in balance (so grease doesn't make you flat-footed), but you probably won't need more than that. Put what's left in sense motive and/or listen.

Feats: My recommendation...

1) Shadow Blade
3) TWF
6) Weapon Finesse

You can probably hold off getting Adaptive Style until ECL 9... swordsages get so many manuevers that they can usually get through most battles without worrying about recovery. If you want it earlier, consider dipping Swashbuckler, Psychic Warrior, or Fighter to pick up Weapon Finesse and the +1 BAB. This would let you pick up Improved TWF at ECL 9, otherwise you'll probably pick that up around ECL 12.

You might want to consider dipping one level of Warlock to get darkness at will. Then you can pick up Blend into Shadows (from Drow of the Underdark) to get Hide in Plain Sight (at ECL 1, if you are so inclined!). There's the whole Mage Slayer/Blindfight/Pierce Magical Concealment trick, where you can ignore concealment but your opponents can't, but it's pretty feat-heavy, hard to do that and TWF+Shadow Blade without a two-level dip into Psychic Warrior/Fighter. Check Person_Man's Adept of Darkness thread for ideas in that direction:

http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=57352

Maneuvers: My recommendations...

SwordSage 1:
Burning Blade (DW1)
Wind Stride (DW1)
Sapphire Nightmare Blade (DM1)
Shadow Blade Technique (SH1) (ok, this strike isn't crap... no save, and possibly 1d6 cold energy damage)
Wolf Fang Strike (TC1)
Sudden Leap (TC1)
Stance: Island of Blades (instant "I LURVE YOU" from any rogue in the party)

SwordSage 2:
Counter Charge would probably be good for a small quick gnome... you may get +4 on an opposed dex roll, and this is a good counter against PA/Leap Attack/Shock Trooper charging barbarians.
Stance: Normally I go with Stance of Clarity, but Flame's Blessing can be situationally useful, and it gets better as you level up.

SwordSage 3:
Mountain Hammer. This is your multi-purpose can opener tool. Ignores DR and hardness, so can be used as an infinite number of shatters every other round. Also incredibly useful against golems, outsiders, and anything that likes to get pretty smug behind a lot of DR.

SwordSage 4:
Cloak of Deception. Invisibility for one round.
Replace Wind Stride or Counter Charge with something a little more sexy... normally I'd say something like Fire Riposte or Emerald Razor, but Shadow Jaunt may be just too useful. It's a good "get out of jail/entangle/grapple/pit free" card.

SwordSage 5:
Mind Over Body. This helps out with your weakest save.
Stance: If you're going TWF, take Assassin's Stance for 2d6 Sneak Attack. This also allows you to take Staggering Strike later on. If you're not so big on the TWF and just want to be really really sneaky, Dance of the Spider gives you infinite spiderclimb. Both stances are immensely useful.

SwordSage 6:
Death Mark: Normally I'm not a big fan of the Desert Wind strikes, since everybody and their dog tends to have fire resistance/immunity, but it's an area-effect that's useful for taking out multiple low-level mooks.
Replace one of your strikes with Insightful Strike. This is your first strike with damage that scales up as you max out your Concentration ranks.

Oh, I forgot about the illusion thing... You may want to consider going SwordSage 3/Wizard (Illusionist) 3, and then going into Jade Phoenix Mage. You can take three more levels of non-Martial Adept and still get 9th Level Manuevers at ECL 20, if you're so inclined. Unless you'd rather do the whole Shadowcraft/Killer Gnome thing... not sure how that'd work, but you'd want to maximize your spellcaster levels with just a garnish of SwordSage. Another build if you want to do the Gish thing:

SwordSage 2/Bard 4/Jade Phoenix Mage 4/Sublime Chord 1/JPM +6/<something> +3