[3.5] Sell me on a fun build.

[overduegalaxy]

First, let me get this out of the way: Optimization does not matter for this game. This is a very casual game, and if I start overshadowing the rest of the PCs, nobody will be having fun. However, I do want the build to be at least somewhat playable, so no classes or PrCs that are just outright awful (CW Samurai springs to mind).

Allowed books are Core + PHB2, Complete..., Races of..., Environmental books, and OA, plus other reasonable books (Tome of Battle is not included. Don't even bother suggesting it).

I have no idea what level we're starting at yet, so don't worry about that (although it will probably be below 11). I want to try something new, so here's classes I'm NOT interested in: Artificer, bard, beguiler, ninja, ranger, rogue, scout, sorcerer/wizard, swashbuckler, warmage.

As far as party roles, I don't want to tank, and I'm not really interested in skill monkey (been doing that a lot lately). Glass cannon could be fun, but I'm open to just about everything.

[Emperor Tippy]

None of the books you listed are any fun. See if you can go Factotum (Dungeonscape), those are fun. Or a Psion (expanded psionics handbook), those are also fun.

Warlocks are fun if you have access to feats and invocations from other sources. Wu Jen can be fun but you don't have access to Incantatrix so the Wu Jen's fun potential is limited.

If you can swing the Book of Vile Darkness then a wizard could be fun (poke'balls of doom are fun).

[Vexxation]

Would you be up for a Drunken Master who specializes in improvised throwing weapons? I think it required monk, drunken master (duh) and bloodstorm blade. Someone may still have the build.

Basically, use anything as a thrown weapon, dealing damage equal to unarmed strike.

Only have a teacup and a paperclip? 2d10 thrown.

[RTGoodman]

Hey, what about a gnome illusion-master? Maybe go with a Gnome (Whisper or otherwise) Beguiler/Mindbender/Shadowcraft Mage or something like that. Everyone loves Gnomes, and everyone loves tricking people, so why not?

Would you be up for a Drunken Master who specializes in improvised throwing weapons? I think it required monk, drunken master (duh) and bloodstorm blade. Someone may still have the build.

ToB isn't allowed, so no Bloodstorm Blade.

[overduegalaxy]

None of the books you listed are any fun. See if you can go Factotum (Dungeonscape), those are fun. Or a Psion (expanded psionics handbook), those are also fun.

Expanded Psionics Handbook is "core", technically.

[Vexxation]

ToB isn't allowed, so no Bloodstorm Blade.

It's doable without it...
You just can't throw Flurried Kamas and have them return without the returning property...

[KKL]

Everyone loves Gnomes

False, I myself and several other people utterly hate Gnomes. I make it a point to attempt to kill whatever Gnome I come across as a PC. My hate for them is that profound.

[mikeejimbo]

False, I myself and several other people utterly hate Gnomes. I make it a point to attempt to kill whatever Gnome I come across as a PC. My hate for them is that profound.

Yeah, I've found more people that hate gnomes than love them, actually. I like gnomes, myself, but the rest of the group doesn't like them so much. On the other hand, we all hate elves much more than gnomes.

[Biffoniacus_Furiou]

A LN Cleric of Zarus is both fun and tanky. Start with the Strength and War domains, go Cleric 6/ Divine Oracle 4/ Contemplative 10, pick up the Oracle, Law, and Destiny domains in that order. Visit the Frog God's Fane detailed in Complete Scoundrel to get the Knowledge prerequisite feat for free. DMM: Persistent would probably be over the top, but DMM: Chain Spell would be a lot of fun. Chained Enlarge Person for buffs, Hold Person for offense, and eventually you can use Chain Spell on the Power Word spells from the War domain and on Hold Monster from the Law domain. Be sure to get Power Attack and maybe Extra Turning for DMM and Quicken Spell later on for some lower-level buffs.

[monty]

False, I myself and several other people utterly hate Gnomes. I make it a point to attempt to kill whatever Gnome I come across as a PC. My hate for them is that profound.

What are you talking about? I love gnomes!

They're tasty.

[Keld Denar]

If you want high damage output while still being robust, I'd suggest my Dwarven Flurry Fury build. He wields an Urgosh!!!!! Freakin awesome.

Spoiler

Show

So, I was thinking of an idea...who ever uses the Dwarven Urgosh....I do! The trick is, not to use it as a double weapon, but to wield each side individually as if you were wielding 2 twohanded weapons. That way, you get all the benefits of 2handed fighting (1.5x str, 2:1 PA) but you are still using an awesome ass weapon and qualify for Flurry of Strikes and Slashing Fury.

Dwarven Urgosh Flurry Fury!
Dwarf 28 PB Str 16, Dex 10, Con 17, Int 10, Wis 14, Cha 6
Final stats with items Str 26 (30 rage), Dex 10, Con 24, Int 10, Wis 14, Cha 6
1 Ranger1 Track, Endurance Favored Enemy: Arcanists (get 4 ranks in prereq skills, 2 ranks Kn:Relig xclass)
2 Fighter1 Power Attack (5th rank in Climb + Jump)
3 Fighter2 Hold the Line, Weapon Focus: Urgosh (5th rank Kn: Dung xclass)
4 Barbarian1 Spirit Lion Totem (5th rank in Survival class + 3 Craft:Weapon)
5 Barbarian2 Uncanny Dodge (3rd + 4th rank Kn:Relig xclass)
6 Deepwarden1 Track again... True Believer (Kn:Arc 3 ranks)
7 Deepwarden2 Stonewarden (Kn:Arc 4th rank xclass Spellcraft 2 ranks xclass)
8 Pious Templar1 Mettle (Spellcraft 3rd rank xclass)
9 Pious Templar2 Improved Init (Spellcraft 4th rank xclass)
10 Pious Templar3 Weapon Spec:Urgosh
11 Exotic Weapon Master1 Flurry of Strikes Trick
12 Pious Templar4 Leap Attack Melee Weapon Mastery: Slashing
13 Occult Slayer1
14 Occult Slayer2
15 Occult Slayer3 Slashing Fury
16 Occult Slayer4
17 Occult Slayer5
18 Pious Templar5 Battle Blessing
19 Pious Templar6
20 Pious Templar7

So, what do you get?

Con to AC (AC 37 with +5 mith fullplate and +5 animated shield, 41 vs giants)
Mettle
7th level PT casting as swift actions (spells like Righteous Fury and Rhino's Rush)
Mind Blank
Spell Reflection 2x/day
40 movement in Mith Fullplate while Hasted.
Pounce
DR 2/-
Very strong fort save, decent will save, weakish reflex save (meh)
Full 20/20 BAB
Smite Attack (good for final iterative)
Always set for a charge (Hold the Line) + Double damage from Urgosh spike
Best part is: with Haste, feats, str, and +5 weapon, attacks at +30, +30, +30, +30, +25, +20, +15 before misc buffs.

A bit of a late bloomer, but all in all, very strong offensively and defensively.

Gear at 20 is +6 str and con items, Boots of Speed, +1 Animated Energy Immunity Deathward Mithril Lg Shield(with MV), +1 Energy Immunity Deathward Mithril Fullplate(with MV) probably a +5 Vest of Resistance. Still lots of room for gear. Probably a +1 Wounding Transmuting Valorous//+1 Brilliant Energy Urgosh, made from Adamantine or Star Metal.

Might be a bit more optimized than you are looking for, but all in good fun. Its basically your average BDF build, with some good immunities and some nice buff casting with PT spells (use Spell Compendium). Good damage output like any self respecting glass cannon, but more robust. Why does high damage have to come at the expense of defenses? This guy kicks ass.

[Prometheus]

See if your DM will allow a homebrew from the boards.

[monty]

See if your DM will allow a homebrew from the boards.

Lightning Warrior.

[Vortling]

Play a beguiler straight up. Gnome if you like, or not if you don't like them. Go to town with illusions.

[SurlySeraph]

Lightning Warrior.

You mean this abomination? In a humor campaign, maybe. In anything else, no.

[monty]

You mean this abomination? In a humor campaign, maybe. In anything else, no.

What, you don't like the d20 hit dice? I suggested that to my DM once, and almost tricked him into it before he finally looked at it.

[Keld Denar]

What, you don't like the d20 hit dice? I suggested that to my DM once, and almost tricked him into it before he finally looked at it.

But the full wizard casting, full BAB, all good saves, and d20 HD are BALANCED by the fact that he can't specialize, or have a familiar! ITS BALANCED, SERIOUSLY!

[monty]

But the full wizard casting, full BAB, all good saves, and d20 HD are BALANCED by the fact that he can't specialize, or have a familiar! ITS BALANCED, SERIOUSLY!

I like the guy who kept saying "stuped" to all of his comments.

[Talic]

Depends on your idea of fun.

If you like different options, and always looking for new ways to solve problems, then a caster is the way to go.

If you don't get bored easily, and you are a fan of a niche, go with it.

Barbarian: Take barbarian/fighter/Frenzied Berserker
Bard: Bard to seeker of the song.
Caster: If you are experienced? Focused specialist Transmuter wizard
If not? Specialist Transmuter wizard
Cleric: Too many ways to take it to pin down on one. You can emulate too many other classes.
Fighter: Go for PHB2 feats, and go charger or lancer.
Rogueish: Either Lurk (Complete Psionic) or Halfling Rogue (Racial substitution from Races of the Wild)

Lurk has a lot of versatility, for a melee class, as well.

[Draz74]

I recommend a pure Dragonfire Adept. Battlefield control magic with very little paperwork. Powerful but not too powerful. Easy to be effective, but still requires some good playing to reach its full potential.

[Thant]

Anything, even the super boring Fighter from PH, but roleplay it for real. No power play, just pure role play.

[Stupendous_Man]

Anything, even the super boring Fighter from PH, but roleplay it for real. No power play, just pure role play.

You can even role-play dying a dramatic death too.

First, let me get this out of the way: Optimization does not matter for this game. This is a very casual game, and if I start overshadowing the rest of the PCs, nobody will be having fun. However, I do want the build to be at least somewhat playable, so no classes or PrCs that are just outright awful (CW Samurai springs to mind).

Sounds like you should play a monk.

[mabriss lethe]

Binders from Tome of Magic are extremely fun, you can tank, blast, or diplomance as you see fit. You can rule an army of the undead...if you want. you can be a sneaky ninja. Etc... And they're fun as can be to roleplay.

I'd also second either Invoker class (Warlock or DFA.) Fun to play, a decent selection of gimicks, and virtually no book keeping.

[Wih]

Avenging Executioner (CSco) and Ghost-faced Killer (CAdv) make an interesting combination. Entry by Ninja3/Fighter2 seems reasonable enough. You'll have decent skills, a whole chunk of extra damage from Sudden Strike - which you'll pretty much be able to use against anything you can get into a state of Fear.
Pretty much it's a nice little intimidation build. But as anything intimidation based, it has it's problems. But it should prove to be fun.

[Zergrusheddie]

Warlocks from Complete Arcane. They do Xd6 damage ray attacks, every round, forever. I believe it starts at 1d6 and goes up every 2 levels. You can't cast spells, but you get 'incantations' that you can do at will (Fly, D. Door, Spider Climb). I had lots of fun playing by Halfling Warlock who climb on top of the walls in the dungeon and rain down 6d6 Ranged Touch Attacks every round.
Those guys aren't EXTREMELY powerful, but they are damn fun.

Best of luck
-Eddie

[kamikasei]

plus other reasonable books

Is that "anything you can reference that the DM might accept, but ToB is preemptively excluded" or are there restrictions based on your access to or ownership of books?

You might consider a Duskblade, as a striker/damage-dealer rather than a tank. Or a shapeshift druid. In connection to the mention of Warlock, what about a Cleric/Warlock/Eldritch Disciple so you can zap people with healing mojo from afar? And then there are recommendations from outside the specifically listed books, such as factotum, or psion.

On the other hand, you have Sandstorm (I think that's the relevant book). That means you have access to the PrC you have to kill a hippo to qualify for. That means YOU HAVE TO TAKE THAT CLASS.

[Taffimai]

I can't believe nobody has suggested druid yet. They are so versatile, there is just no end to the fun.

Want to buff and heal? You can. Want to control a small army of summoned creatures to sick on your enemies? They're yours. Want to get in there and personally deliver gory justice? Yep, you can do that. Want to just blast away shouting "nukey!-nukey!-nukey!-..." Yeah, you can do that. Want to reshape and control the battlefield so it favours your allies? You guessed it, you have the spells for that.

Add natural spell for extra flavour. Oh, and you get a nifty pet.

[Mushroom Ninja]

Beguilers are great fun and pretty strong as well.

[Kizara]

Personally, you could do what I did in a campaign once:

Barb 1/ftr 2/paladin of slaughter 3/Frenzied beserker 10 (started at lvl 7, conviently).

Favored of Erythul, he lived for combat and conquest. However, he wasn't a 1-dimensional enforcer, had a great sense of humor, lead his tribe of barbarians in a fairly responsible manner and generally was a blast to play.

I think his base stats were like 19 (level bonus), 10, 18, 12, 12, 14.

He took leadership at level 6 (it was also a warlord/leadership oriented campaign) and he picked up a converted, goth, ex-priestess of pelor, noblewoman (read: punk catholic schoolgirl, and basically RPed as such) as his cohort. She supported him with healing, status removal and some buffs.


Was this character pretty optimized? Sure, and I used DMM (reach spell) for the cleric, but still he was a blast to play and for all the people who refuse to play non-casters without serious cheese or ToB, this guy was an absolute riot to play, both RP and in combat.

The DM was flabbergasted when I took out a party of 4 wartrolls, it was fantastic. :)

[The Mormegil]

I recommend a pure Dragonfire Adept. Battlefield control magic with very little paperwork. Powerful but not too powerful. Easy to be effective, but still requires some good playing to reach its full potential.

+1

I love that class.