Silent Death
---
20 Monk/19 Assassin/1 Shadowdancer

Silent Death dashes into battle unseen, slicing his opponents to pieces with the fury of his dual Kamas. He dodges incoming attacks with skill and grace, and spells seem almost to bounce off of him, rarely doing him any harm. And in the rare instance that things get really bad, he leaves the battle as quickly as he entered, melding with the shadows to evade his attackers.

---
Starting Race: Elf

Starting Class: Monk

Starting stats:

Str: 10
Dex: 20
Con: 10
Int: 10
Wis: 14
Cha: 8

Skills: 4 Hide/4 Lore/4 Move Silently/4 Tumble

Feats: Two-weapon Fighting

---

Level progression:

Monk:
Level 3: Weapon Finesse
Level 4: Dex: 21
Level 6: Ambidexterity
Level 8: Dex: 22
Level 9: Weapon Focus: Kama
Level 12: Improved Two-Weapon Fighting, Dex: 23
Level 15: Dodge
Level 16: Dex: 24
Level 18: Toughness
Level 20: Dex: 25
Assassin:
Level 21: Epic Weapon Focus: Kama
Level 24: Armor Skin, Dex: 26
Level 27: Great Dexterity I (Dex 27)
Level 28: Dex: 28
Level 30: Great Dexterity II (Dex 29)
Level 32: Dex: 30
Level 33: Epic Prowess
Level 34: Great Dexterity III (Dex 31)
Level 36: Improved Sneak Attack I, Dex: 32
Level 38: Improved Sneak Attack II
Level 39: Improved Sneak Attack III
Shadowdancer:
Level 40: (Final Skill point scores, all starting increased by 1 each level: 43 Hide, 43 Lore, 43 Move Silently, 43 Tumble), Dex: 33

---

Final Stats:

Str: 10
Dex: 20
Con: 10
Int: 10
Wis: 14
Cha: 8

37 AC
+38/+38/+35/+35/+32/+29/+26 (with Flurry mode off)
+36/+36/+36/+33/+33/+30/+27/+24 (with Flurry mode on)
30 Spell Resistance

Pros of this character:

-50% concealment (causes half of enemies' attacks to miss)
-Immune to Disease, Poison, and Mind-Affecting
-First arrow shot always misses (Deflect Arrows)
-Attacks of opportunity from combat movement never hit (54 Tumble)
-Very high saving throws
-Evasion/Improved Evasion means you take little to no damage from the likes of Fireball and other reflex-save spells
-Monk Speed means you always move as if you have boots of haste on
-Quivering Palm DC 32 (Fortitude) for instant death, once per day
-Heal self for 40 HP once per day
-Hide in Shadows to hide during combat
-54 Move Silenty/54 Hide means you're as good as invisible
-Darkness and Invisibility special abilities help with this
-13D6 Death Attack acts like Sneak Attack, but with a chance to paralyze your opponent
-If your opponent isn't paralyzed, Improved Knockdown sees to them being on their butt
-20/+1 Damage Reduction stops most nonmagical attacks

---

So in conclusion, this character is a master of dashing in invisibly, killing quickly, and getting out. But even if he has to stand his ground, it's almost impossible to hit him... and all of this is without any equipment except two basic Kamas.

Feel free to PM me and comments and corrections to this build.

Edited By Kail Pendragon on 05/08/09 09:46

Grumble66

Joined: 29 Feb 2004 Posted: Monday, 05 April 2004 02:13PM

Quote: Posted 03/28/04 07:52:52 (GMT) by AeroBLASTER

Silent Death
---
20 Monk/19 Assassin/1 Shadowdancer


Everything up to taking level 40 looks great. However, you missed something in your feat allocation - Shadowdancer requires both Dodge and Mobility, and the latter is missing in your build.

In the long run, it's probably best to replace Improved Sneak Attack III with Mobility, though due to its usefulness early on I'd probably get it in place of Toughness and pick Toughness up later in place of something else.

The only other thing about the build that I don't agree with is pretty minor: passing up Discipline and UMD in favor of Lore. Lore is handy and all, but I try not to put convenience skills into my builds. You can get Discipline to 23 in 20 levels of Monk, and with a little tewaking you can get UMD to 20 in 19 levels of Assassin.

I took UMD up like any other skill while as an assassin, but at level 37 I stopped putting points into Tumble (leaving it at 40), and put the extra points into UMD to round it off to 20. Then at level 40 I maxed hide/move silently to 43 and put the remaining 5 points in Listen, for lack of anything better to do with them.

If you rearrange the order of levels you can get Discipline to 43 (by taking Monk 20 at clvl 40), but that requires mixing a lot of things up and IMO isn't really worth it.

Anyway, a very intriguing build, which I'm in the process of testing. Just wanted to point those two minor things out.
Quote: 
-50% concealment (causes half of enemies' attacks to miss)
I know this is an old build and the author probably doesn't live here anymoe but is the above quote an error? I can't see how the build gets 50% concealment.. is that the same as taking Self Concealment V?
Quote: Posted 05/05/05 00:46:05 (GMT) -- Dropbear1967

Quote: 
-50% concealment (causes half of enemies' attacks to miss)
I know this is an old build and the author probably doesn't live here anymoe but is the above quote an error? I can't see how the build gets 50% concealment.. is that the same as taking Self Concealment V?

I believe he is referrring to the Monk's "empty body" ability.
_________________
Homer: Lisa, would you like a donut?
Lisa: No thanks. Do you have any fruit?
Homer: This has purple in it. Purple is a fruit.
Quote: Posted 05/05/05 01:33:11 (GMT) -- grizzled_dwarflord

Quote: Posted 05/05/05 00:46:05 (GMT) -- Dropbear1967

Quote: 
-50% concealment (causes half of enemies' attacks to miss)
I know this is an old build and the author probably doesn't live here anymoe but is the above quote an error? I can't see how the build gets 50% concealment.. is that the same as taking Self Concealment V?

I believe he is referrring to the Monk's "empty body" ability.
Also, doesn't Assassin get improved invisibility as a spell like ability? That gives 50% concealment even if PC is seen or detected.
_________________
A Man of War who treads the world's roads alone, as I do, must be quick. Long ago I learned to strike swiftly and without scruple. I trouble no man without cause, but one who attacks me had best resolve himself to die! I got on this build with the build searcher, and i think it's a quite good build... only REAL bad thing here is HPs. They are quite low for a meleer, even with HiPS and such. If you get it twice in most servers (without criticals) you are dead or at least out of combat until you get outside combat range and sleep.

I've made some improvements (IMO) to it by taking Epic Dodge on 27. (Also i had to take all 5 self concealments, for my PW caps the monk self concealment ability at 20%. Not something hard to do, since this build get 3 improved sneak attacks, which (again IMO) is pretty useless. I also dropped Epic Prowess.)

Other thing i did in my improvements was trade 14 wis for int, since with this new set i would not only get 2 more DC on Death Attack, also 2 more points of skill. (one of the "seeing the unseen" class (spot/listen) and UMD, for lots of buffs.)

With this changes you can get your Ab a little higher, with scrolls, you only lose 2 AC/will save and get a lot harder to hit (since you now dodge the first attack every round.)

P.S.: Sorry for reviving it.
P.P.S.: Forgot to say... to take Epic Dodge on 27 you need defensive roll, so i lvled SD to 5 for it. (and in my PW, SDs only get HiPS on lvl 5, so it was needed anyway.)

Edited By mindcontroler on 05/06/09 18:43

So basically...you completely changed the build. While I think it would be interesting to see your build, it seems significantly different compared to this one to post it separately if you're willing.
Quote: Posted 05/06/09 18:21 (GMT) -- mindcontroler

I got on this build with the build searcher, and i think it's a quite good build... only REAL bad thing here is HPs. They are quite low for a meleer, even with HiPS and such. If you get it twice in most servers (without criticals) you are dead or at least out of combat until you get outside combat range and sleep.

I've made some improvements (IMO) to it by taking Epic Dodge on 27. (Also i had to take all 5 self concealments, for my PW caps the monk self concealment ability at 20%. Not something hard to do, since this build get 3 improved sneak attacks, which (again IMO) is pretty useless. I also dropped Epic Prowess.)

Other thing i did in my improvements was trade 14 wis for int, since with this new set i would not only get 2 more DC on Death Attack, also 2 more points of skill. (one of the "seeing the unseen" class (spot/listen) and UMD, for lots of buffs.)

With this changes you can get your Ab a little higher, with scrolls, you only lose 2 AC/will save and get a lot harder to hit (since you now dodge the first attack every round.)

P.S.: Sorry for reviving it.
P.P.S.: Forgot to say... to take Epic Dodge on 27 you need defensive roll, so i lvled SD to 5 for it. (and in my PW, SDs only get HiPS on lvl 5, so it was needed anyway.)

While self concealment sounds great on paper, requiring 30 dex and such coupled with the fact you can easily, especially with UMD, dupicate it with a scroll spell, most of us consider it too great an inveestment for such a little pay off. Improvement? thats an iffy one.

Taking ED means you had to change the level split like you said, so this isnt the same build at all. Interesting that you feel it is especialy with epic dodge and self conceal 5. That in itself suggests a new idea, which was sort of done here Click Here

The other thing is, this is posted by billO. If you see that tag, it means that this build is older than the sun. THis is also done for PVP as can be suggested by taking SD at lv 40. So, this isnt really a run through build.

All this said, it would be more than polite to post YOUR build in its own thread so we can see it for its own merits or lack ther of, depending. Improved Sneak Attack isn't just pretty useless, it's completely useless on a build that only has Death Attack and no Sneak Attack (since, unless it was changed in 1.69, it's bugged so that you can take it with only Death Attack, but it does nothing unless you've got at least one d6 of Sneak Attack).
_________________
People who say that I am arrogant are mistaken. Arrogance is a flaw; I am flawless. Unchanged, need a sneak attack feat from either rogue or blackguard to deal improved sneak attack damage (I haven't tested this with the item property sneak attack to see if that could trigger improved sneak attack). Here Assassin has a large disadvantage. Again, where were you guys 5 years ago when this was designed!!!! iirc, that would have been patch 1.00001! LOL jk
Quote: Posted 05/06/09 19:55 (GMT) -- avado

Quote: Posted 05/06/09 18:21 (GMT) -- mindcontroler

I got on this build with the build searcher, and i think it's a quite good build... only REAL bad thing here is HPs. They are quite low for a meleer, even with HiPS and such. If you get it twice in most servers (without criticals) you are dead or at least out of combat until you get outside combat range and sleep.

I've made some improvements (IMO) to it by taking Epic Dodge on 27. (Also i had to take all 5 self concealments, for my PW caps the monk self concealment ability at 20%. Not something hard to do, since this build get 3 improved sneak attacks, which (again IMO) is pretty useless. I also dropped Epic Prowess.)

Other thing i did in my improvements was trade 14 wis for int, since with this new set i would not only get 2 more DC on Death Attack, also 2 more points of skill. (one of the "seeing the unseen" class (spot/listen) and UMD, for lots of buffs.)

With this changes you can get your Ab a little higher, with scrolls, you only lose 2 AC/will save and get a lot harder to hit (since you now dodge the first attack every round.)

P.S.: Sorry for reviving it.
P.P.S.: Forgot to say... to take Epic Dodge on 27 you need defensive roll, so i lvled SD to 5 for it. (and in my PW, SDs only get HiPS on lvl 5, so it was needed anyway.)

While self concealment sounds great on paper, requiring 30 dex and such coupled with the fact you can easily, especially with UMD, dupicate it with a scroll spell, most of us consider it too great an inveestment for such a little pay off. Improvement? thats an iffy one.

Taking ED means you had to change the level split like you said, so this isnt the same build at all. Interesting that you feel it is especialy with epic dodge and self conceal 5. That in itself suggests a new idea, which was sort of done here Click Here

The other thing is, this is posted by billO. If you see that tag, it means that this build is older than the sun. THis is also done for PVP as can be suggested by taking SD at lv 40. So, this isnt really a run through build.

All this said, it would be more than polite to post YOUR build in its own thread so we can see it for its own merits or lack ther of, depending.

Is there a leveler of sorts (a builder, anything like that) to download somewhere? I don't really know how everything went on the build. I went playing and taking the levels knowing what i would put there in place of someone i saw here, but i don't remember the exact leveling order.

Also, there is something i must take into account, that being the fact my pw has a sub-race system, which made up for 2 more dex/wis on lvl 1 and ambidexterity, with me paying only 2 cha for all this. (In other words, i sorta started with 22 dex.) But if i can find something like i said over this, i'll gladly try out my build with no sub-races and see how it goes.

BTW, you pointed out some interesting things i didn't take into account. Especially about SC being hard to get and with it being completely switchable for any spell that gives the same concealment (like Imp Invis), but you must also take into account the fact that spells can be dispelled. (specially the ones from scrolls) So, even as hard it is to get SC, it's still a good choice and no "little pay off" feat.
Quote: Posted 05/06/09 22:29 (GMT) -- mindcontroler

So, even as hard it is to get SC, it's still a good choice and no "little pay off" feat.
Sure it ain't dispellable but it costs 5 feats and that's a HUGE investment. Gimme a wand of Improved Invisibility any day of the week and twice on sundays. Now, if one wants to go for SCV for theme reasons, sure why not. I have my own SCV builds but I'm well aware that I would have been better off going for "just" ED and using Imp Invis wands. Especially when one feat alone (BF) counters 2 and a half feats of the 5 you spent.


Check out the amazing Kamiryn's Character Build Calculator to create your own builds. A word of warning: it is highly addictive.
_________________
They can't stop us
Let them try
For Heavy Metal
We will die

Edited By Kail Pendragon on 05/06/09 22:46

You can also use debug mode. Make a character and load it into a single player mod. Type the following:

##DebugMode 1
##GiveLevel 39
##DebugMode 0

And voila...you can level it up to 40 and see if it's legal. If you want to test it against stuff, using a mod like the one Kail linked to would be a good idea.

Edit: Sorry, that's an excel spreadsheet for a build template. Still highly useful, but not a mod. So, my bad.

Edited By Magical Master on 05/07/09 01:50

Dispels? Oh, that is the cry of the player who isnt strong enough to care for themselves and relys on tricks and stuff like sc5 to attempt survival.

Look at it this way when you are trying to decide IF sc5 is a big investment. YOu need 30 dex, so just maybe a halfer or elf can hit that at lv 30. That's nice, BUT you only are given 7 epic general feats! 5 is ALOT of 7! Now, if you start at 20, that means you now have 27 dex. Opps, you need 3 feats and you only have 2! Starting to see the HUGE investment? Yes, you get bonus feats and stuff which you must consider, obviously. Oh, and you can get the EXACT same effect with a wand! Yep, ill take the HUGE investment any day....


*(can you see the humor in my writing??)
_________________
Quote: Posted 07/08/06 16:20:00 (GMT) -- Thaxll'ssyllia

I think avado answered your question like no other could...
Quote: Posted 05/06/09 22:29 (GMT) -- mindcontroler
Is there a leveler of sorts (a builder, anything like that) to download somewhere?

Try this one: Click Here As for ISA, I just tested and ISA feats work (deal their damage) even from the Sneak Attack feat on items. Death attack sneaks are separately categorized on enablecombatdebugging, so you need a sneak attack feat to generate the sneak attack damage type to which ISA can then be added to. ISA does not add to the damage type death attack. So assassins if they take ISA need to obtain a sneak attack feat from some source.
Quote: Posted 05/07/09 11:51 (GMT) -- WhiZard

As for ISA, I just tested and ISA feats work (deal their damage) even from the Sneak Attack feat on items. Death attack sneaks are separately categorized on enablecombatdebugging, so you need a sneak attack feat to generate the sneak attack damage type to which ISA can then be added to. ISA does not add to the damage type death attack. So assassins if they take ISA need to obtain a sneak attack feat from some source.
Nothing new under the sun then.
_________________
They can't stop us
Let them try
For Heavy Metal
We will die
Quote: Posted 05/07/09 18:25 (GMT) -- Kail Pendragon

Nothing new under the sun then.

WHAT!!! Kail, this is earth shattering news! A build from before time began has been debated and found to be flawed, and since the original builder probably hasnt cared about nwn since 2003 or so, this is all totally mind blowingly, california dumping into the ocean news!!!

Like i said before, where were you all before time began in order for us to have fixed this build when the poster actually cared if it was working or not?
_________________
Quote:  -- Posted by Kail Pendragon

Being hyperbolic is an integral part of Avado's being
You're just whining for no reason avado. That just proves how much attention this build got. The build was posted on April 11, 2004 and the first reply was on May 4, 2005, over a year later. Only 4 replies back then and then it was forgotten until 2009, not much was said about the build from the beggining. So if you weren't there to be posting replies either, I don't see what you're expecting.

I don't know about old builds, I usually find annoying when the excuse to point something out is only valid on the newest version, but when it comes down to "old builds weren't as powerful as the new ones because no one was a proficient yet", well, I hold no special values for old learning trees, their time and usefulness is over. The build is not illegal with that, only bugged.
_________________
"My name is Thaxll'ssyllia, but you simians may refer to me merely as "Sir", if you prefer a less... syllable intensive workout."

Edwin Odesseiron - Baldur's Gate II: Shadows of Amn

Edited By Thaxll'ssyllia on 05/07/09 20:22