This build was made with the idea of creating an elven killer that can do mincemeat with anything not immune to sneak. When a silent and deadly response is required, this is the elf the council calls upon.
I wanted to get epic dodge as early as possible, get self concealment V, and avoid xp penalties. I have seen similar builds, but none that met my requirements. Hope you like it.
Here it is.
Race: Elf Alignment: Any non-evil
Starting Stats:
S 10 C 10 W 10 D 20 - 32 Int 14 Ch 8
Level Progression:
1 R Dodge 2 R 3 R Weapon Finesse 4 R 5 R 6 R Mobility 7 R 8 R 9 R Weapon focus: Shortsword 10 R *Improved Evasion 11 CoT 12 CoT Ambidexterity, Two-Weapon Fighting 13 CoT 14 CoT Knockdown 15 R Improved TWF 16 R 17 R *Defensive Roll 18 R Imp. Knockdown (opt) 19 R 20 R *Slippery Mind 21 SD Epic Dodge 22 R 23 R 24 R Epic WF (opt), *Improved Sneak (opt) 25 R 26 R 27 R Great dex I 28 R 29 R *Improved Sneak (opt) 30 R Great Dex II 31 R 32 R 33 R SC I, *SC II 34 R 35 R 36 R SC III 37 R *SC IV 38 R 39 R SC V 40 R
*= Rogue bonus feat (pre and post epic) Opt= can be replaced by another feat
Raise Dexterity throughout
Skills:
You have enough skills points to maintain 9 skills maxed out throughout. Make sure Hide, Move silently and Tumble are part of it for the build integrity.
Attack schedule with normal weapon:
38/33/28/23 38/33
Damage: Sneak attack: 18d6 Max sneak damage in one turn: 648 (6*18*6, will never happen, does not mean much) Average sneak damage in one turn: 378 (6*18*3.5)
Naked AC: 29
Saves:
F21 R37 W18
Comments are welcomed!
Edited By Cinnabar Din on 02/25/08 02:45
Very nice!
simular to the dagger based STR and Dex variants posted recently (in concept) very nice build for an assassin esque elf i'll try it out! Shame the server i play has banned SD _________________ Yume No Chikara
The power of Dreams. In Japan you don't say have a dream, you say see a dream.
There is a slight problem in your build order. One of the prereqs for Epic Dodge is 30 ranks in tumble. That's doesn't count your DEX bonus; it means 30 skill points invested in tumble. It's impossible to get Epic Dodge before level 27. But, you can easily switch your feats around to fix that.
There is a slight problem in your build order. One of the prereqs for Epic Dodge is 30 ranks in tumble. That's doesn't count your DEX bonus; it means 30 skill points invested in tumble. It's impossible to get Epic Dodge before level 27. But, you can easily switch your feats around to fix that.
Steve
Actually its not, Epic dodge only requires 1 rank of tumble. Its a feature thats even exploited on Biowares own Epic Build page with the rogue archer that takes it at level 24.
Really? Sheesh. Even the grimoire didn't catch that. I wonder why such an obvious bug hasn't been fixed yet.
Anyway, while building this up to test it (it did of course allow Epic Dodge at 21 as Syrath says due to that bug), I came across one other minor issue. For whatever reason, even though Ambidexterity and Two-Weapon Fighting are on the Fighter Bonus Feat list, they are not on the CoT bonus feat list. Unsure if this is a bug or due to the fact that the CoT seems like a sword and board type class, but it's true. That means you can't take Ambidexterity and Two-Weapon Fighting at level 12. You can take Ambidexterity and Knockdown at level 12, Improved Knockdown at level 14, Two-Weapon Fighting at level 15, and Improved Two Weapon Fighting at level 18.
Really? Sheesh. Even the grimoire didn't catch that. I wonder why such an obvious bug hasn't been fixed yet.
In there own words (iirc). It would break too many builds.
Quote: Anyway, while building this up to test it (it did of course allow Epic Dodge at 21 as Syrath says due to that bug), I came across one other minor issue. For whatever reason, even though Ambidexterity and Two-Weapon Fighting are on the Fighter Bonus Feat list, they are not on the CoT bonus feat list.
Ive noticed that before.
Quote: Unsure if this is a bug or due to the fact that the CoT seems like a sword and board type class, but it's true. That means you can't take Ambidexterity and Two-Weapon Fighting at level 12. You can take Ambidexterity and Knockdown at level 12, Improved Knockdown at level 14, Two-Weapon Fighting at level 15, and Improved Two Weapon Fighting at level 18.
Steve
My only major criticisms are the build is , why take 4 levels of COT. It gives you an extra attack (at -22 AB when dual wielding. It gives +2 to all saves, handy but hardly essential. Fighter would be good, but you get an XP penalty ( but you do get specialisation for an epic +6 damage against sneak immune), it also gives another feat. 2nd criticism would be that you take improved sneak attack , you could take great dex at level 21 (for the greater good) and take epic dodge on your bonus feat level. This would set you up for earlier concealment. Concealment IMO is better than dodge when used alone, since it is useful against spells and melee and against ALL attackers.
Syrath _________________ It's SHADOWDANCER, dammit, shadowdancer!!!
Thanks for the comments. When I tested the build I entered the feats in a slightly different order so I did not catch the issue with the CoT feat list, the correction proposed makes sense.
I am using CoT instead of fighter because of the xp penalty. If that is not an issues, fighter makes a stronger build for sure. However, in the analysis of the benefits of using CoT as opposed to rogue only, you get a +1 advantage of BAB on all attacks also which is important. This type of build is either hit-and-run or a flanker. For the hit and run, you want to make sure you hit as often as you can, that's why I tried to optimize AB.
And yes, the build can be changed to bring the first concealment from level 33 to 29, but that's at the cost of delaying epic dodge from 21 to 24 and loosing one of the improved sneak or the epic weapon focus. I think it's an equally good choice and it depends on the server you play on. In my case, with slow leveling, delaying from 21 to 24 means weeks if not months and I rarely make it post-30 with a character anyhow, but for faster leveling servers, it sounds like a good alternative.
Actually, if you don't mind waiting a little for epic dodge and the SC I-V, using human and fighter is probably the best build once at level 40. (That build must have been posted before but I am not certain as I searched the list with CoT). We are a little far away from the starting goal of the build though!
