*There are alot of Dragon's out there...I didn't intentionally copy someone. I worked this up on my own as far as I know.*
Druid18/Monk18/COT4
Half-Elf *I choose this because you hardly ever see them, and I really didn't need the extra pre epic feat.*
S-13 D-8 C-8[12] Interchangeable with Charisma. Depends on if you plan on useing Smite Evil....I'd rather have the extra Con for when I'm not in form. I-13 W-18(32)All your improvements should go here. Ch-12[8]
1-D Expertise (Spend points on SpellCraft on Druid Levels save any other points for monk levels) 2-M Max Tumble/Hide/Move/Discipline (5) 3-D Improved Expertise 4-D Wis(19) 5-D 6-D Power Attack 7-M Max Tumble/Hide/Move/Discipline (10) 8-D W(20) 9-D Improved Power Attack 10-D 11-D 12-M W(21)Weapon Focus (Anything but Unarmed) *I choose kama* Max Tumble/Hide/Move/Discipline (15) 13-D 14-D 15-D Improved Crit (Unarmed) 16-CoT W(22) 17-M Max Tumble/Hide/Move/Discipline (20) 18-CoT Blind Fight, Extended Spell 19-CoT 20-CoT W(23) Great Cleave Sixth Unarmed Attack Gained. 21-D Great Wisdom I (24) 22-M Max Tumble/Hide/Move/Discipline (25) 23-M 24-M W(25) Great Wisdom II (26) 25-M 26-M 27-M Great Wisdom III (27) 28-M W(28) 29-M 30-M Great Wisdom IV (29) 31-M 32-M W(30) 33-D Dragon Shape 34-M 35-M 36-D W(31)*ArmorSkin* or whatever you want 37-M Max Tumble/Hide/Move/Discipline (40) 38-D 39-D *Toughness* or whatever you want 40-D W(32)9th level spells gained Max Spellcraft and I put 1 point in Openlocks.
Unbuffed, Unshifted and Naked Attacks = 27/24/21/18/15/12 Unbuffed but in Dragon Form Attacks = 45/42/39/36/33/30
1/QPlam DC = 41 (Should equal 30 but in testing it kept coming in at 41 unshifted/unbuffed) *Owls Wisdom will raise DC* 18/StunningFist DC = 41 *Owls Wisdom will raise DC* 2/EmptyBody = 50% concealment Improved Knockdown while in Dragon Form = + to hit on normal sized creatures, which means they are going down! Improved Expertise for anoth 10 AC Improved Power Attack to help break thru DR. 1/Animal Companion to draw some attacks away from you in an emergency. 1/Lay on Hands - Limited use on you...You'll have over 800 HP. Works better if you took a higer chrisma. 1/Smite Evil - Extra to hit and damage...more chrisma makes it better. 1/Wholeness of Body - Again..with 800Hp this isn't doing much for you. Flurry of Blows - Doesn't work with Power Attack, but if you are fighting creatures without DR then it's an extra attack.
Other Forms Improved Wildshapes - Not much use Elemental Form - Usefull in case you come up against an enemy that has Dev Crit, or if you are fighting in an area that is hard to move a Dragon around in.
Why Int 13 and Str 13? If you need the Int better to go Int 14 and take the extra skills.
Because I need a 13 for power attack and a 13 for Expertise.
You could raise those if you want...I would suggest raising strength...it get overridden when you shift...there is no need for more, but there is a minimum need of 13 in both.
I feel it's has enough skill points, but if you want more then sacrifice some Con/Chr. Tumble Hide MoveSilent Discipline SpellCraft are basiclly maxed. I don't really care about any other skills. I put 1 point into openlocks just so that I could open locks....in dragon form that one point turns into 15. I had a couple of other free points...I also put 1 into disable traps which turns into 15.
This is a dumb question, but why not take fighter levels instead of Champion of Torm? The fighter levels give you weapon specialization unarmed strike (epic specialization too if you micromanage some feats) and lets you focus in unarmed strike which helps your dragon. The CoT levels give +2 to saves and some charisma based abilities, but with 12 charisma there isn't much to be gained by them anyway.
I have to agree that you aren't taking full advantage of CoT. You could of taken every level post epic and used used the bonus feats from the class for great wisdom . You also could probably live with a lot less monk levels. Personally I would look at going with only enough monk levels to get improved knockdown and then putting the rest to CoT. This would net you a lot more feats and probably access to dragon shape a lot earlier. _________________ Come visit the Epic Builders Guild for all the character info you could ever want or need: Click Here
Quote: Posted 11/03/04 22:28:14 (GMT) -- Aligory
This is a dumb question, but why not take fighter levels instead of Champion of Torm? The fighter levels give you weapon specialization unarmed strike (epic specialization too if you micromanage some feats) and lets you focus in unarmed strike which helps your dragon. The CoT levels give +2 to saves and some charisma based abilities, but with 12 charisma there isn't much to be gained by them anyway.
I can't take fighter levels because I would then suffer an xp penalty unless I kept fighter and monk within a level of each other all the time. The highest class is the favored for human or half-elf.
Quote: Posted 11/03/04 23:02:24 (GMT) -- Emrill
I have to agree that you aren't taking full advantage of CoT. You could of taken every level post epic and used used the bonus feats from the class for great wisdom . You also could probably live with a lot less monk levels. Personally I would look at going with only enough monk levels to get improved knockdown and then putting the rest to CoT. This would net you a lot more feats and probably access to dragon shape a lot earlier.
You are correct..I could take CoT levels epic and get bonus great wisdom feats. But then I would have to loose 1 attack per round and I decided I would rather have an extra attack a round then be a Dragon 3 levels sooner. I want 18 monk levels for 50% concealment....do I have to have that...no...1 or 3 or 6 or 12 monk levels would suffice for some builds. It depends on what you want. I want 50% concealment so I needed 18 levels. I also want 9th level spells so I need 18 Druid Levels. Why 9th, because I want to Meta Magic my 8th level Premonition.
Your points are all good however, but just not the way I envissioned this character.
Thanks for the input.
P.S. I want 50% concealment because I get sick of boss monsters on PW's that have Dev Crit. Sometimes a boss is too much for my elemental forms, or I just want to stay a Dragon, to handle so I figured it's real hard for them to dev crit me if they right off the bat have a 50% chance to miss me. So basiclly it's a way to help keep alive as an elemental. Plus it will also help the Dragon out. noting like a 80 - 90 ac and 50% concealment.
Edit...added P.S.
Edited By WarriorCleric on 11/04/04 00:37
Improved Expertise and Improved Power Attack? Doesn't make a lot of sense to me. You've got IKD, why would you want to use either of these instead?
If you can Great Cleave then you don't need to. Only point in GC is to get OC & DC. In fact Cleave is probably not much use to this Char either.
What use is the weapon focus? You're not going to melee in human form - are you?
Better boost your spellpower instead if you're taking 18 levels of Druid.
Take Toughness early and you can then take Epic Prowess at 39.
BTW Aligory most Unarmed Feats do not work with Shapechanging. Only one that does IIRC is Improved Crit.
Oh, I thought all feats transfered between forms. And, why will the CoT not give an xp penalty while the fighter will?
Quote: Posted 11/04/04 21:34:35 (GMT) -- Aligory
Oh, I thought all feats transfered between forms. And, why will the CoT not give an xp penalty while the fighter will?
Because fighter is a base class where as CoT is a prestige class. Prestige classes and favored classes don't count to multiclassing penalties.
In this instance whatever his highest level class is, becomes his favored so it is ignored. The third class being a base class would make two of his classes check against each other. He could still get away without an xp class and fighter levels as long as his two lowest level classes were within one of each other. _________________ Come visit the Epic Builders Guild for all the character info you could ever want or need: Click Here
Ok..I don't know why, but it appears you are trolling for a fight. So let me answer these. And ask a question...do you play single player or do you play on a persistant world?
Improved Expertise and Improved Power Attack? Doesn't make a lot of sense to me. You've got IKD, why would you want to use either of these instead?
The expertise feats help quite a bit in the early levels. The power attacks also help you do damage against creatures that have high damage reduction. IKD will work with both of those feats running...it's not 1 or the other. IKD should be spammed out on all attacks..unless you are fighting something of equal size. If equal size do it untill they are knocked down then attack regular. If you are fighting small or medium, then use IKD with every attack.
Quote: If you can Great Cleave then you don't need to. Only point in GC is to get OC & DC. In fact Cleave is probably not much use to this Char either.
Great cleave was choosen because it was a CoT bonus feat and there wasn't anything better available.
Quote: What use is the weapon focus? You're not going to melee in human form - are you?
Do you even understand the pre reqs for CoT? Has to be profeicent in a Melee weapon.
Quote: Better boost your spellpower instead if you're taking 18 levels of Druid.
The druid spells are for buffing...The idea of this character is to be a Dragon. I can't cast anything but epic spells as a Dragon, and I don't have enough Druid levels for them. The only spell enhancer I need is Extend spell to lengthen my pre battle buffs. I stress PRE BATTLE...that's why I did not take concentration as a skill.
Quote: Take Toughness early and you can then take Epic Prowess at 39.
Ok...I think I put 3 feats down that were builders choice....heck take that instead of Great Cleve...I think CoT has that on the bonus list.
The reason I asked if you play on a PW is most PW bosses that I play on are immune to just about everything Knockdown, Sneaks, Crits, DeathMagic and so on. Plus they usually have pretty good DR. So that is why the Power Attacks.
As much as it doesn't make any sense..it is the case....Dragons can take a pounding, and do some cool stuff and look cool doing it but they don't dish out alot of damage. This is an attempt to make one that can do slightly more melee damage, just cause I thought it would be fun.
Probably the best Dragon build would be Druid5 Monk3 Shifter32...Then instead of doing Melee...breath fire...breath lightning..and breath gas. One should be able to do damage. And while you are breathing you could have Improved Expertise on to give you about an 85 - 91 AC...depending on equipment and buffs.
Edit Left out something in the IKD part.
Edited By WarriorCleric on 11/05/04 01:25
Quote: Do you even understand the pre reqs for CoT? Has to be profeicent in a Melee weapon.
This was disrespectful to you and I should not have worded my response in this manner.
I would like to say I'm sorry now before this escalates.
Sorry
Actually I've never played CoT except as a melee type so I didn't realise it was needed.
I play on lots of PWs, but perhaps they're not the same as yours as I've never had bosses so tough that putting in Improved PA would have improved my damage. I understand that it will work for you if you only hit them on a 20.
Improved Expertise, OTOH, only works if you can hit them easily, but they can also hit you easily. If it worked while you cast spells it would be a useful feat, but as it stands I can't see why you would take it. If you get a KD then the other side can't attack you, why would you greatly reduce the chances to get that hit? OK, it might (not that I really believe this - I find Druids really easy to play early on) have some benefit early on as a purely defensive measure, but it has no use in the long run, so I feel sure that there are better uses for two feats.
Only reason I can see for going to Druid 18 is to get more spells, you only need 13 levels for Dragon, so that's why I suggested spell-related feats. Maybe, instead you should replace some Druid levels by Monk ones - I don't see many buffs in the level 8 & 9 spells.
Is there any benefit of taking the Monk levels so early on? I know it get's you an extra Tumble AC each time, but at the expense of spell progression and your animal companion. Alternatively you could start Monk, seeing as you don't get the Dragon shape till level 33.
Another thought - if you take some CoT levels post Epic, won't that give you extra feats?
P.S. I'm not trolling for a fight. TBH I just feel that this build is not quite right.
It really depends on where you play. I play on 2 servers, 1 that you can get to 40 in maybe a month of hard playing and the other.. it is nearly impossible(has never been done). If the lvling is slow, then you would want to get dragonshape as soon as possible.
Feats like epic weap foc and epic prowess DO help unarmed ab when in dragonshape. I would highly recommend them.
Another important thing to know is how often you can rest. 2 uses of empty body for 18 rounds is not that great when you need 10 mins to rest. What kind of AC can you get on your build on the server you play? Mine has armor skin and 90+ ac with merging a +5 armor, +5 shield, and maybe a helm with +3 deflection. Not sure you'd need 50% conceal.. plus the dragon now has 40/+6 DR.. that will be hard to break through.
For druid buffs you will want max/emp bulls, aura of vitality, and maybe blood frenzy. I was able to find a shield with +3 str and that will merge too. So you could take more druid lvls actually for better duration and makes it harder for you to be dispelled. Also have to take into acct owls insight(by lvl 24 it gives a full +12 to wisdom) The point may be to go dragonshape but with the high wisdom you will get some nice magic to use.
Personally, I am a fan of the 20 druid/10 cot/10 monk, 26 druid/ 8 COT/ 6 monk, or maybe even a 28 druid/ 10 CoT/ 2 monk. These builds can buff to 80 ac.. with items this can get boosted a little more. One server I play on allows the ac bonuses to stack from merged items. The default somehow makes them all deflection and they wouldn't stack.
I kinda like the shifter build too as the dragonbreath can deal 100+ dmg.. though I think the DC sucks..
Actually I've never played CoT except as a melee type so I didn't realise it was needed.
I play on lots of PWs, but perhaps they're not the same as yours as I've never had bosses so tough that putting in Improved PA would have improved my damage. I understand that it will work for you if you only hit them on a 20.
Improved Expertise, OTOH, only works if you can hit them easily, but they can also hit you easily. If it worked while you cast spells it would be a useful feat, but as it stands I can't see why you would take it. If you get a KD then the other side can't attack you, why would you greatly reduce the chances to get that hit? OK, it might (not that I really believe this - I find Druids really easy to play early on) have some benefit early on as a purely defensive measure, but it has no use in the long run, so I feel sure that there are better uses for two feats.
Only reason I can see for going to Druid 18 is to get more spells, you only need 13 levels for Dragon, so that's why I suggested spell-related feats. Maybe, instead you should replace some Druid levels by Monk ones - I don't see many buffs in the level 8 & 9 spells.
Is there any benefit of taking the Monk levels so early on? I know it get's you an extra Tumble AC each time, but at the expense of spell progression and your animal companion. Alternatively you could start Monk, seeing as you don't get the Dragon shape till level 33.
Another thought - if you take some CoT levels post Epic, won't that give you extra feats?
P.S. I'm not trolling for a fight. TBH I just feel that this build is not quite right.
I like IE...it comes in very handy. There are times I don't want to attack, but also don't want to hit anything so I'll activate it. Like breathing or casting a spell(not if dform) or calling a companion. You can also turn it on when running thru an area to give you that 10 ac bonus. You can...start running, then activate it while running and it stays on. Or turn it on and click on a chest or a dorr or a enemy and it stays on while you move thru a danger zone. My main reason for it is obviosly defense. If I have a ridiculous AC then maybe I live much because I hit the boss every so often while he whiffs. My style of play with this kind of character is probably different then others. I don't ever play in natrual form...I only play in shapes. So the only thing I use spells for is pre battle buffs.
The build is called the Order of the Dragon because it's designed around my cultist view towards the Dragon form.
If you can design a better melee Dragon please do. I would love to see it. It's too bad DCrit doesn't work in DForm...I tested it with a Druid/Wiz/RDD. I do not know if overwhelming works or not.
I bet the Barb rage feats would work, but I don't know if you could get them and dform. A 25 strength and 30 wiz without RDD would be tuff.
As far as I am concerned all shapshifter builds that require a high Wisdom should have Monk. It's just silly not to get that AC bonus.
Please post your own Dragon build...the more there are to look over the better.
I really like the Puff builds....I wish leveling tables were available for all 3 versions.
No there's no point in Barbarian as you need Wis 25 and Str 25. Maybe you could get there as a Half-Orc, but you would not only sac too much else, but you would get no benefit to the Str in Dragon form. Can't be worth it.
I see your points on IE, but when you have a Monk, you don't usually have to worry about travelling around. In fact my last Monk build hardly got hit at all. Still, lots of people seem to like IE, so I must be wrong.
I don't think I've seen a better melee Dragon than the Dragon Savant build. DD as the third class makes a lot of sense. Still not up to Puff tho' - Epic Warding is one hell of a spell.
(quote)Posted 11/07/04 19:34:45 (GMT) -- Thorsson64
I see your points on IE, but when you have a Monk, you don't usually have to worry about travelling around. In fact my last Monk build hardly got hit at all. Still, lots of people seem to like IE, so I must be wrong.
quote]
Thorsson64, you say you mostly play melee characters so perhaps you aren't aware of one of the benefits of Improved Expertise: for a spellcaster you can go into Imp. Expertise mode while in combat (casting spells). As long as you are holding a melee weapon (staff, dagger, etc) you can shift into IE mode and have +10 Armor Class immediately. This is nice when you're chanting and don't want to have get disrupted. In IE, you don't have to attack with your weapon, you just stand there and get 10 added to your AC.
I see your points on IE, but when you have a Monk, you don't usually have to worry about travelling around. In fact my last Monk build hardly got hit at all. Still, lots of people seem to like IE, so I must be wrong.
quote]
Thorsson64, you say you mostly play melee characters so perhaps you aren't aware of one of the benefits of Improved Expertise: for a spellcaster you can go into Imp. Expertise mode while in combat (casting spells). As long as you are holding a melee weapon (staff, dagger, etc) you can shift into IE mode and have +10 Armor Class immediately. This is nice when you're chanting and don't want to have get disrupted. In IE, you don't have to attack with your weapon, you just stand there and get 10 added to your AC.
Kaliban.
That is the jest of it. The feat is bugged in NWN because when casting you are flat footed, and in pnp IE won't give you a bonus when flat footed (no DEX either). In NWN you do not lose the IE defense while casting liek you should. Hence like I stated in another thread, you get 10 AC at virtually no cost to offense when you use it while casting. _________________ Come visit the Epic Builders Guild for all the character info you could ever want or need: Click Here
Ah, that explains it then . Someone should make a list of all these advantageous bugs in NWN...
Still, as a Sorc with Mestils/DA/ES up and running, I often want to get a bit (as long as they don't do too much damage, which is generally the case unless they have dev crit and I'm not immune).
Because I need a 13 for power attack and a 13 for Expertise.
You could raise those if you want...I would suggest raising strength...it get overridden when you shift...there is no need for more, but there is a minimum need of 13 in both.
Just want to say that for expertise you need 13 dex not strength.... somebody probably already said it though
You need 13 INT for expertise not DEX
Actually I've never played CoT except as a melee type so I didn't realise it was needed.