El Mariachi - dual double handcrossbow action

[Gruftzwerg]

Welcome to my newest optimized character build. This thread has reminded me that I planned such a build for a longer time. So this build will be a dual wielding double crossbow user with some flavor added to become...

El Mariachi

Spoiler: Deepwyrm Half-Drow

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Darkvision up to 60 feet.

Dragonblood Subtype: Deepwyrm half-drow are of the dragonblood subtype (see page 4).

Drow Blood: For all special abilities and effects, a half-drow is considered a drow.

Immunity to sleep spells and similar magical effects.

Spell-Like Abilities: 3/day—detect magic; 1/day—disguise self. The caster level for these effects is equal to the character level of the deepwyrm half-drow.

+1 racial bonus on Listen, Search, and Spot checks.

+2 racial bonus on Bluff and Gather Information checks.

Urban Druid 1 / Bard 1 / Swordsage 1 / Fighter 4 / Deepwood Sniper 7 / Nentyar Hunter 1 / Earth Dreamer 5

Spoiler: Note: More MAD than SAD

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While DEX is our main ability score that we want to max if possible, we can profit great from other stats too. CON (min.13) for HP and Earth Sense/Dreamer and WIS (min 15) to cast our divine spells later on. INT is also great to maximize Perform and Diplomacy as much as possible.

Build Progression:

After the first 7 lvls you are free to adjust the prc progression to your liking. I would start with Deepwood Sniper since it offers the nice crit chance and multiplier bonuses and than end with Nentyar Hunter & Earth Dreamer. But if you want the spell progression and the special abilities of Earth Dreamer first go for it (just keep in mind the earlier BAB loss and that when you don't have "keen" your Blood in the Water stacks will stack slower and fewer times). But more to that later.

Level Progression:

* = Fighter Bonus Feats
** = Feat for first Flaw
*** = Feat for second Flaw.
**** = Swordsage bonus feat

Spoiler: 1: Urban Druid

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Point Blank Shot
A prerequisite and our first step on stack +1 attack and dmg bonuses (up tp 30ft).

**TWF**
Self explaining. The first step for offhand attacks.

***Precise Shot***
To avoid the -4hit penalty for attacking into melee with a ranged weapon. This build has already enough penalties to deal with. Thus a nice to have feat.

Urban Druid
First, it fits the fluff being an urban character. Second, because it gives us proficiency crossbow (any)! This saves us 2 feats for hand-crossbow and double-hand-crossbow (since crossbow ain't a defined term in 3.5 "any" applies to all crossbows, even double crossbows). Further it provides us with a free mount (light warhorse) that can be replaced within 24h if it dies.

Spoiler: 2: Drow Fighter Racial Substitution Level

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*Hand Crossbow Focus*
Reload (a single) hand crossbow as free action. Also counts as Weapon Focus and gives +1 to attack rolls. Basically Rapid Reload and Weapon Focus for hand crossbows. For reloading while TWF with these see Reload section below.

Drow Fighter Racial Substitution Level
"Hit and Run Fighter" is priceless for this build in the early levels and is still a reliable boost at later lvls. It gives you +Dex mod to dmg rolls when your enemies are flat-footed within 30ft (surprise round; Grease; Marbles; Ice Slick..). We lose Heavy Armor Proficiency, which is irrelevant for this max DEX build anyway. And as a nice icing on top it gives +2 untyped bonus to Initiative-

Spoiler: 3: Half-Elf Bard Racial Substitution Level

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Half Elf Bard Racial Substitution Level
"Soothing Voice" replaces Countersong which already almost never sees use. Spend a daily use of Bardic Music to emulate Calm Emotions. The Will save DC is determined by a Diplomacy roll! Max Diplomacy for maximum abuse.

Bard ACF: Healing Hymn
Replaces Fascinate with the ability to increase heals from cure spells with your perform rank (up to the max possible due to caster level for that cure spell). Further if used before going to bed/rest, it counts as you would rest for full 24h, despite the circumstances under which you are sleeping.

Draconic Aura: Vigor
This one is really cheesy. +1 Fast Healing for everyone under half of his maximum HP. And since the build is dragonblooded, it increases with class lvl (any! no class specified) and goes up to +4 at lvl 20. Together with Healing Hymn, you will easily cover most of the healing needed by your allies.

Spoiler: 4: Fighter

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*Crossbow Sniper *
Mainly because it gives us 1/2 DEX bonus to our crossbow attacks. Together with Hit and Run Fighter this makes up to 1.5 x DEX mod for our attacks.

Spoiler: 5: Swordsage

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****Weapon Focus: (Kukri)****
We have to pick a melee weapon focus (free from Swordsage) and Kukri has the best critchance to keep up stacks (see below) if you should need to fall back to melee for some odd reason.

Swordsage:
This single lvl dip gives us so much tools. Even the low lvl maneuvers can be useful. But most important is the stance that is mandatory for this build.

Spoiler: Maneuvers

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* = Recommend Readied Maneuvers

Distracting Ember - (Swift Action) Small fire elemental dummy to get flanking until end of your turn

*Moment of Perfect Mind - Use Concentration checks in place of Will save.

*Cloak of Deception - Greater Invisibility until end of your turn. Gets lesser interesting when you can effort to buy a wand and can than be replaced with something else.

*Counter Charge - (Immediate Action) chose to make an opposed Str or Dex check with your enemy (enemy has to use the same ability score as you!). +4 on Str if you are bigger or +4 on Dex if you are smaller. If you win the check, you enemy may not attack you with his charge and you may place him up to 10ft away from you. Perfect against those nasty ubercharger/pounce builds/monsters.

*Mighty Throw - Melee touch attack with special throw attempt. Than make a Str or Dex check with a +4 bonus and not restricted by enemy size. On success the enemy moves up to 10 ft away and is prone. A good tool if you get cornered by enemies and don't have an escape route option otherwise available. Since it is only a standard action, you may move away afterwards.

Sudden Leap - jump as a swift action. Gets more interesting if you are apart from your mount for longer time.

Stance: Blood in the Water
This is our bread & butter. While in this stance you get for each crit a stacking and duration refreshing (1min) untyped +1 bonus to attack & damage. And this build will crit a lot on later levels due to high attack rate and critchance. Without this, the build would not even be half as good. It's that important! It will help to deal with attack penalties (up to -6 for a non max BAB build is heavy) and that the dmg skyrockets.

Spoiler: 6: Fighter

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Combat Casting
Mainly because of PRC requirements, since we will avoid melee range and barely cast in combat anyway.

Spoiler: 7: Fighter

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*Weapon Specialization (Double Hand-Crossbow)*
The +2 dmg is nice, but more importantly because of Ranged Weapon Mastery

Spoiler: 8: Deepwood Sniper

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Deepwood Sniper
Make sure that you get Far Shot via either a "Helm of the Hunter" or "Horizon Goggles". Both have minor gadgets, so pick the one you prefer. This prc gives us the needed dmg boost for the otherwise weak crossbows.

Keen Arrows
Doubles our critchance with crossbows = 17-20 which is basically a 20% chance to crit. Helps a lot to get more stacks for Blood in the Water.

Range Increment Bonus
+10 ft./level of Deepwoodsniper (+70ft max for this build added after all other modifiers like Far Shot)

Spoiler: 9: Deepwood Sniper

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Earth Sense
Prerequisite for Earth Dreamer PRC (if you go for an alternate build, this feat can be exchanged); use move action to sense creatures direction (but not point/square) up to 20ft.

Concealment Reduction
Your miss 10% less when an enemy has concealment bonuses.

Magic Weapon
If it would have been Greater MW.., but this will be barely used. Only if you still miss access to +1 weapons and can't effort a wand of GMW.

Projectile Improved Critical +1
Now our crossbow crits for x3.

Spoiler: 10: Deepwood Sniper

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Poison Use
Not mandatory but still a nice to have ability.

Spoiler: 11: Deepwood Sniper

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Spoiler: Take Aim

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A 4th-level Deepwood Sniper can gain a +2 bonus on her attack rolls with a bow or crossbow against a stationary target by aiming carefully. Taking aim is a full round action, and if the target moves more than 5 feet during that period, the bonus is lost. No additional benefit exists for spending more than 1 round aiming.

Imho Take Aim has some Raw abuse potential.
First it mentions "attack rolls" so it applies definitively to more than a single attack.
Second, there is no duration mentioned!
Third, the move restriction only applies for the round aiming!
If your DM approves this, it's a great ability to start a fight against single strong enemy. This way you can make faster use of your extra attacks and reliably hit with em.

Spoiler: 12: Deepwood Sniper

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Ranged Weapon Mastery: (Piercing)
+2 to attack and dmg. Mainly for the attack bonus to further compensate our penalties, but the dmg bonus is also nice to have.

Consistent Aim
1/day reroll an attack roll. Not great, but nice to have I guess.

Spoiler: 13: Deepwood Sniper

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Concealment reduction 20%
Now we are 20% less likely to miss a concealed enemy

Spoiler: 14: Deepwood Sniper

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Consistent Aim
2/day reroll an attack roll, still not great but yeah^^

Projectile Improved Critical +2
Now our crossbows crit for x4 dmg. Yes pls!

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Till here the build is mostly set into stone, except the Earth Sense feat^^.

After this point you are free to make adjustment for picking prcs. I would recommend to dip a single lvl into Nentyar Hunter since it gives you up to 5th lvl spells (for 5 lvls of progression) including healing spells and greater magic weapon. Since the prc abilities are meh, so we'll use the Earth Dreamer prc that will progress the NH spellcasting and five us some other nice to have abilities for this build. It may not fit the El Mariachi flavor so much, but is otherwise a great end for this build. Keep in mind that you can rearrange all lvl behind 7. So if you want to fill the roll as primary healer and have the abilities, you could push it.

An alternate build option would be to take a 2nd lvl Bard to get Alarm and enter Abjurant Champion. Gives you a higher BAB & casterlvl at lvl 20 (both 17 with fractional BAB at 20). But the downside is only up to 3rd lvl spells. And the abilities are not even close as useful as the suggester build route, which was the reason for me to suggest the other as standard build. You may think otherwise but I wanted to mention it.

You may even think about other options and alter the build to your desire. Just the Feats are still hardly recommend, since they are a big part of this build.
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Spoiler: 15: Nentyar Hunter

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Greater TWF
Make sure you already bought the Gloves of Balanced Hand to get Improved TWF. I don't think these feats needs more explanation^^.

Nentyar Hunter
We need a Dark Blue Ioun Stone for Alterness and a Mask of the Tiger for Track to enter this prc. As mentioned this gives us access up to 5th lvl spells over 5 lvls. Gives us access to Greater Magic Weapon (best as wand due to needed caster lvl to get +5 bonus) to enchant our ammunition. This should be a good compensation for the fact that this build caps at +14 BAB (missing the 4th attack for mainhand). As said a single lvl dip is ennough.

Woodland Stride
It's for free, so why not^^

Spoiler: 16: Earth Dreamer

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Earth Dreamer
Besides from the 1/2 BAB downside a great PRC with nice at will abilities. This helps us to become an unstoppable killer. Since Nentyar Hunter has only 4 lvls of spellcasting left, we will use the last lvl (20) to give Urban Druid a lvl of spellcasting progression.

Earth Friend
Creatures with earth subtype react friendlier to you. Initial attitude improves by one step.

Spoiler: 17: Earth Dreamer

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Earth Dream
"Ask a mountain" while dreaming^^ high chance to get the answer if it is in the mountains territory. And since you only get a correct reply (if at all), this is better than the regular spell version iirc. 1/day and needs 10min.

Spoiler: 18: Earth Dreamer

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Dead Eye
Gives use DEX bonus to enemies in 30ft range. Together with all the other sources this build can stack up to 2.5 x DEX bonus!

Lesser Tremorsense 10ft.
Up to 10 ft you can pinpoint any creature (maybe besides incorporeal..^^).

Spoiler: 19: Earth Dreamer

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Earth Sight
Standard Action (At will !) - duration 3+CON mod rounds
See through stone, dirt, or almost any other sort of earth except metal to a range of 30 feet. This helps you to look into most buildings, behind walls and many other things. Look into the ground for treasures^^.

Spoiler: 20: Earth Dreamer

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Earth Glide
Standard Action (At will !) - duration 3+CON mod rounds
This ability is nuts. You can always dive through earth like an earth-elemental and leave no trail. This makes you really unstoppable. Enter any building, appear behind an enemy from the ground/wall, escape into save mother earth^^, so much abuse potential. And since it is at will, you can abuse it as much as you like (to pay the standard action every 3+CON mod rounds). A great cornerstone ability for this build, but also a good reason to think about altering the lvl progression if you want it earlier. Up to your liking.

Magic Items / Gear

Spoiler: Items for Prerequisites (as already mentioned in the build):

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- Horizon Goggles (8K g) or Helm of the Hunter(9K g) for the Far Shot feat
- Gloves of Storing to draw and hide your crossbows as free action and to easily reload while TWF.
(combine the Gloves for increased price as described in the rules)
- Cloves of Balanced Hands gives us access to Improved TWF. Recommend after hitting lvl 7 (+6 BAB), but before hitting 15 (Greater TWF)
- Dark Blue Ioun Stone gives Alertness. Get it before lvl 15 for Nentyar Hunter.
- Mask of the Tiger gives use Track. Also before 15 for NH.

Marbles 2s
Marbles are cheap and your first tool to victory. Always buy many of em and let your warhorse carry em. They cover a 5ft square and forces Balance checks. Unless the victim has 5 ranks in Balance (who ever has that?^^) is considered flat-footed and thus our Hit and Run Fighter ability kicks in. Since the application is dropping them into enemy space, we will abuse an Unseen Servant (see below) to do the job.

Collar of Perpetual Attendance 2K g
Pls approve with your DM first, since the item did came out as a April Fool. But it follows the regular item creation cost for such an item. So, not so cheesy as the April Fool joke may make it look like. It gives at will Unseen Servant, which will deploy your marbles on enemy spaces all day long. If your DM should deny this option, use a Drow House Insignia for Unseen Servant as replacement.

Horseshoes of Flame 32K g
Now your warhorse can fly and you can fire from even more safe positions. Further the nightmarish look is nice. And now it is likely that your mount has a higher INT (+10) score than you. Teach him languages, rename him Mr. ED and ask him for advice all day^^

2x Double-Hand-crossbow named "Lady and the Tramp" each 200k g
"Lady" + 1 (+3 Splitting, +2 Exit Wound, +2 Phasing +1 Silence +1 Spell Storing)
"the Tramp" +1 (+2 Exit Wound, +3 Slpitting, +3 Force, +1 Spell Storing)
+ Wand Chamber (2x 100g) for each. One with Grease, the other with Greater Invisibility
+ Oil Chamber (2x 1000g) if you want to play with poisons
+ Prismatic Burst (2x 30,000g) Since this build relies on crits, this is the fallback strategy against those that are immune to crits to get some extra dmg.

Drow House Insignia (spell) 1st=620g; 2nd=3,300g; 3rd=8,200g
Clvl 5 (always!) and once per day casts a specific spell (chosen at creation/when bought) up to 3rd lvl. Use it for Ice Slick (cleric 1st, like grease but 20ft square). The 5 rounds are normally enough to do the job. If you want more charges/day or other spells, these can be stacked with the normal magic item stacking rules. The item text even mentions that more powerful drow may have multiple spells on it.
This item is highly recommended to further abuse Hit and Run Fighter.

Spoiler: "Last Breath"-Battle Rezz Cheese (optional)

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While this trick is optional for the build, you should give it a try to get access to it. We need a Druid that can cast Last Breath (4th) as a Sanctum Spell (outside of the area) so that it fits as 3rd lvl spell into our Drow House Insignia. For the druid, either try to convince a teammate to play one with the feat or try to find one. Even a sidequest for this would be acceptable (and imho fun and good rp for such a powerful trick to get). Later finding a crafter who than can bestow together the spell into your Insignia should be of a lesser problem. Once this preparation is complete you can pull out the following trick:
1: Store every unused charge of your Insignia into your Spell Storing Crossbows
2: If an ally should die, shoot his "lazy ass" stable (-1hp)^^!
This method ensures that your ally is really dead and not somewhere between -1 and -9 and and lets him incarnate without the normal penalties. Further we have a crazy range with the Crossbows compared to the regular touch range. Due to dual spellstoring weapons we can store up to 2 battle rezz this way. You couldn't ask for a better combat medic imho.

Spoiler: Defensive Item options:

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Bracers of Armor and if you can effort it buy a pair for your mount too.
Animated Riders Shield you don't need to hold it and you can profit from it together with your mount. All wished fulfilled.

Spoiler: max. DEX

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Gloves of Dexterity +6
5x Whish for +5 Dex

Together with the +5 from lvl up this is a +16 increase to DEX. Really important to ramp up our starting dmg with all the DEX to dmg feats (2.5x). Assuming a base at lvl 1 from 16/18 we would have 32/34 DEX and a mod of +11/+12. This would add up to +27/+30 dmg to our crossbow attacks if the conditions are met sole from DEX.

Spoiler: Permanent Reduce Person (optional)

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This is recommend if you should adventure more inside of buildings, dungeons and narrow places but still want to abuse your mounts movement. Thus you have to buy it for your mount too.

Combat Power

Spoiler: How to reload

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The first lvls are a bit crippling. Crossbow focus gives you free action reloading for one weapon and drawing a weapon while moving is a free action. For the early level we will use "Shoulder-straps" with our crossbows. The trick is with shoulder straps you don't "lose" your weapon when you "drop" em as "free action". So you can drop and reload each weapon within a single move action. Further, the early level the extra attack penalties are to high to be used with TWF so you will reload after 2 rounds of attacking.
We could have picked Quick Draw to get full attacks with free action reloads even for early lvls, but imho the feat is not worth it and this is a feat-starving build. Instead it makes use of Gloves of Storing to store and draw your weapons as free action and thus reload your single crossbows easily for free (crossbow focus), one after the other. Imho the most elegant way to reload and better than wasting another feat on it

The build has a high attack rate due to TWF and can get even more with the double crossbow attacks when you have gathered enough crit stacks to reliably hit despite the penalties. Each of the attacks will be Splitting into two (only once, but that is enough) and all have Exit Wounds. If you position yourself (with your mounts movement) correct, you can full attack for dozens of attack rolls and possible crits for maximizing Blood in the Water stacks. Wanna annihilate entire armies/legions within a few rounds? No Problem, we have enough firepower. Further we can bypass (either) cover, shield, armor and shoot AC & shields from force effects down.
The dmg starts high (feat bonuses, GMW, 2.5x DEX mod, 17-20/x4) and skyrockets as you gather more Blood in the Water stacks.
We passively heal all allies who have lost more than half their HP and can dish out some emergency heals or later even battle rezz. Imho a well rounded build.

Spoiler: The Perfect Murder

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1. Use Wand of Greater Invisibility
2. Use "Earth Sight" to locate your target behind a wall/inside a building.
3. "Take Aim" with "Lady" who has phasing & silencing
4. SHOOT!
5. Leave as if nothing happened

No trace that someone even entered the building. The target should fall "silently" dead, since the save roll should autofail when dead.

I always thought a crossbow build would never work out good compared to other optimized combat builds, but I guess I have to change my mind here^^.

The End:

As always, thx for reading this big wall of text. I hope you enjoyed it as much as I felt lost while making this build. Let the feedback come. I'm prepared for anything: critic, bugs, rule discussion, suggestions or whatever else you have in mind related to the build.


edit:
- fixed the "Items for Prerequisites" since the items for Nentyar Hunter where missing.
- added Racial traits info
- and a few typos^^

[FauxKnee]

This is a neat idea and it got me thinking--thanks for sharing! I do have a handful of remarks...

This is just to note the oddity rather than to nitpick you. The double crossbows (from the kobold web article) don't use the terms attack action or full attack but instead specify standard actions and full-round actions. That's really weird, especially as the last paragraph suggests you should be able to full attack while dual wielding. I don't know what the right way would be to combine free-action reloads from Hand Crossbow Expert with the double crossbow's odd "iterative penalty" though...

I think Shadow Jaunt is a must-pick if you're entering Swordsage at level 5 (qualifying for level 2 maneuvers.) I would definitely value it higher than Distracting Ember.

I know the x4 crits are delicious, but I honestly think you'd be better off taking some other class for five levels than Deepwood Sniper 3-7. You're spending a really precious resource (class levels) for what, a couple minor benefits and the one good ability of increasing your crit multiplier? With good feat choices, I think even four levels of the much-maligned Fighter, plus one of something else (Warblade maybe, for the ever-popular White Raven Tactics and Iron Heart Surge) would be better. Either way it's worth reviewing the Champions of Valor web enhancement to see if you like the Zhentarim Fighter substitution level at 3 for your current build. It's a free feat if you like the fluff.

If you can pull it off, I think it would be pretty entertaining to dump Nentyar Hunter as well as Deepwood Sniper 3-7 (freeing up the Combat Casting feat slot) and build into Fochlucan Lyrist. You're already a druid/bard, and you named yourself using a musical term, so it's a pretty decent fit in both function and flavor. The major problem is the hefty skill requirement, as well as the question of what to do for level 10 if you don't want a third level of Deepwood Sniper. (FL requires evasion, but you've already indicated that you're content to qualify with things like ring of evasion.)

Woodland Archer (Races of the Wild) is a great feat--give it a look.

Lightning Mace (Complete Warrior) can be build-defining, but does require more investment. You'll probably end up choosing Desert Wind to meet the weapon focus prerequisite. You could get the Reflex Weapon enhancement applied to armor spikes for a "virtual feat" of Combat Reflexes. When paired with the Aptitude weapon enchantment from Tome of Battle so that you get an extra attack whenever a crossbow threatens. If you're going down the road of Aptitude cheese, Boomerang Daze / Ricochet (Races of Eberron) are welcome additions. (Continue the trend of meeting prereqs via items by using a custom item of wieldskill from Player's Guide to Faerun for just 4k gold.)

[Gruftzwerg]

This is a neat idea and it got me thinking--thanks for sharing! I do have a handful of remarks...

This is just to note the oddity rather than to nitpick you. The double crossbows (from the kobold web article) don't use the terms attack action or full attack but instead specify standard actions and full-round actions. That's really weird, especially as the last paragraph suggests you should be able to full attack while dual wielding. I don't know what the right way would be to combine free-action reloads from Hand Crossbow Expert with the double crossbow's odd "iterative penalty" though...

Yeah, the wording of the double crossbows are really confusing to some degree. But I rely on the "works like Rapid Shot feat" reference to have a clear ruling here. This should allow for an extra attack with each double hand crossbow and thus end with a -6 penalty for all attacks (-2 for TWF and -2 for each double hand crossbow). That's why I mentioned that you may want to start a fight with no extra attacks, if you should face high AC enemies. Once you have a few Blood in the Water stacks, you can add the extra attacks.

I think Shadow Jaunt is a must-pick if you're entering Swordsage at level 5 (qualifying for level 2 maneuvers.) I would definitely value it higher than Distracting Ember.

While it is a nice to have ability it is not worth it imho for this build. The Distracting Ember can help to make use of extra attack earlier and thus ramp up your Blood in the Water stacks faster. Shadow Jaunt is an standard action and gets easily overshadowed by early accessible magic items (e.g. Shadow Cloak is an immediate action teleport or Shadow Hands with Shadow Stride at later lvls).

I know the x4 crits are delicious, but I honestly think you'd be better off taking some other class for five levels than Deepwood Sniper 3-7. You're spending a really precious resource (class levels) for what, a couple minor benefits and the one good ability of increasing your crit multiplier? With good feat choices, I think even four levels of the much-maligned Fighter, plus one of something else (Warblade maybe, for the ever-popular White Raven Tactics and Iron Heart Surge) would be better. Either way it's worth reviewing the Champions of Valor web enhancement to see if you like the Zhentarim Fighter substitution level at 3 for your current build. It's a free feat if you like the fluff.

I wanted to focus on max dmg and there aren't any other that have synergy bonuses for crossbows. Further Deepwood Sniper increases the range increment for the crossbow, which is also nice to have. Further most prc I have found where either bow only or had useless abilities. But it is still an option for anybody who wants to go another route.

If you can pull it off, I think it would be pretty entertaining to dump Nentyar Hunter as well as Deepwood Sniper 3-7 (freeing up the Combat Casting feat slot) and build into Fochlucan Lyrist. You're already a druid/bard, and you named yourself using a musical term, so it's a pretty decent fit in both function and flavor. The major problem is the hefty skill requirement, as well as the question of what to do for level 10 if you don't want a third level of Deepwood Sniper. (FL requires evasion, but you've already indicated that you're content to qualify with things like ring of evasion.)

I totally forgot about that prc.. and I even had it on my early notes. But I guess that's the bill for taking more than a week for the PRC research/selection..^^ Thx for pointing it out. I will mention it as alternative option to Earth Dreamer. I would still keep single Nentyar Hunter dip for the better divine spellprogression to use with Fochlucan Lyrist.

Woodland Archer (Races of the Wild) is a great feat--give it a look.

While it is in general a good feat, it gets overshadowed by other feats in this build. And the build is already full of feats and I already outsourced all possible feats to magic items already.
The to hit bonus on miss gets useless after your first few crits in a fight.
The ignore misschance in the next round ability gets overshadowed by an True Sight item and further procs even lesser in this build since Deepwood Sniper already reduces misschances.
The moving sniper ability can be mimicked by riding your mount.

Lightning Mace (Complete Warrior) can be build-defining, but does require more investment. You'll probably end up choosing Desert Wind to meet the weapon focus prerequisite. You could get the Reflex Weapon enhancement applied to armor spikes for a "virtual feat" of Combat Reflexes. When paired with the Aptitude weapon enchantment from Tome of Battle so that you get an extra attack whenever a crossbow threatens. If you're going down the road of Aptitude cheese, Boomerang Daze / Ricochet (Races of Eberron) are welcome additions. (Continue the trend of meeting prereqs via items by using a custom item of wieldskill from Player's Guide to Faerun for just 4k gold.)

Lightning Mace would be a nice option if you can fit it into the build. Would need to change the weapon enhancements and the things you mentioned. Definitively a good dmg boost option. I'll see if I can mention it in the build as option somewhere.

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Thx for your feedback. I'll update a few things when I have a bit more time. The last days I am a bit short on free time. Maybe today or in a few days.

And to all others, I would be happy for more feedback of any kind =)