The darkness presses upon my very soul, but I feel no fear, Tempus walks with me. A simple prayer and all is revealed. The air is heavy with the sweet stench of rot and decay, but I do not feel ill. I am the instrument of his wrath; there is only the defiler and me. Death will meet all who dare to stand in my path. As I walk through this cave, I feel alive; the crunch of gravel under foot is like thunder, the sound of metal plates sliding over each other as I step echoes through my soul. I grip the handle of my hammer, the smooth leather feels like a living thing and the weight brings a smile to face. The passage is straight and the rock is smooth, like it was carved by man, not nature. If it was carved, those who did it are long dead. Lichens, moss and fungi now invade the crevices and flow unchecked over the walls and ceiling, but the floor is bare. That is how I know this place is not deserted; the absence of life is as telling as its presence. The floor no longer descends, it has begun to level out and in the distance Tempus shows me forms unseen to my mortal eyes.
The time for action has come. Tempus shows me his favor, the head of my hammer blazes with flame, almost blinding in contrast to the darkness. Flame burns within me too; strength and power fill every fibre of my being. I feel like a dam about to burst, as I stride forth screaming my God’s name. As I approach the forms, the walls fall away to reveal a large chamber, the forms become clear. Lean forms, too lean for a human, too lean for any living thing. Skeletons, thirty or forty, animated by the defiler to be his servants no doubt. I could destroy them with the very force of my will, but the Spirit of Tempus is upon me. I raise my hammer and bring crashing into the skull of the closest one. It explodes into a shower of splintered bone. As its body falls, my hammer smashes into its companion. My feet trace patterns that they have traced a thousand times in training. These enemies are slow and weak, easy prey for my hammer. I rage like a lion among sheep. Time loses meaning, there is only sound of the breaking bone, the swirling light as the head of my blessed weapon carves out its deadly path, and pounding of my heart. As the last of them falls, I regain my composure. I am unscathed and surrounded by ruin. As my senses retune to the silence, I can hear the scratch of bone on stone from a passage to my left. I set off down a highly vaulted hall to meet this new threat.
I see two more skeletons in the dark. These are not like the others, they stretch up to the ceiling and are girded in fine plate armor. They move swiftly and with purpose, but they are no challenge to one like me. I move towards the nearest one, hugging the wall to keep it between me and the other one. I hunch low and angle my shield to meet its charge. I hear the clash of its sword on my shield and I push forward slamming my shield into its legs. Overbalanced, it begins to fall over me. I push it to the side and smash my hammer into its knee as it falls to the ground. I rush past the hobbled goliath to meet its companion. Ducking a blow from its sword, I rush past it and turn smashing my hammer into its femur. In the narrow hall, it can't turn as fast I can. My hammer falls again, and this time the bone breaks dropping this perversion of nature to the ground. I do not relent, my hammer falls twice more, raising sparks from its iron jupon as I demolish its sacrum. The remaining skeleton has risen to its feet, but the line of its femur to its tibia is off. My strike damaged its joint. I charge forward, blocking its sword with my hammer, I slam my shield into the wounded joint, knocking it down once more. I do not give its supine form a chance to recover, swinging my hammer in a figure eight to build up speed I bring it down against the head of my opponent. Web like cracks radiate from the impact point, as its head rebounds from the ground. My hammer falls again and its skull shatters in a shower of bone.
I walk past the broken remains of my enemies further down the hallway and closer to my quarry. He is close; the foul essence of his being leaves its mark upon the life here. The moss is black and spiny and sticks out the walls like twisted fangs. As walk further down the passage even it gives way, and all around me is smooth stone. I can feel a change in the air, the putrescence is gone but the air is dry, unnaturally dry. It seems to draw the moisture from me and my breath is forced. I can now see the end of the hall; there are two massive Iron doors, so black that even with the eyes of Tempus I can barely discern them. They are the final barrier between me and the defiler. I pause to rest, and renew my faith, reciting prayers that fill me once more with the power of my god and new resolve. With a great push, I open the doors and pass the threshold.
There is light in this chamber, light other than my torch like hammer, light that pushes away shadows to reveal a massive hall filled with columns that rise into the darkness above. The light is not natural, it glows like fire, but I cannot discern its source. There at the end of the hall I can see a large coiled serpentine form. The light emanates from this form. As I stride forth I can see the source of light. Two witch fires gaze malevolently at me from the empty orbits of a reptilian skull through thin ribs. With a swift fluid motion the body extends itself and I can see its full size. It must have been a mighty beast in life, despite the lack of flesh and skin I can feel the vibrations in the ground and the displacement in the air as it rushes towards me. As our gaze meets, there is no need for words; we are both focused solely on the other's destruction. I see a spark of flame kindling in the dracolich's breast, and I pray Tempus shield me as I drop behind my shield. A blast of fire swirls around me, tendrils of it reaching towards my body only to drawn away before I am scathed. As the flame passes, I rise and with a cry of "Tempus!" I charge forth, closing the final yards.
The beast towers over me and rakes at me with bony claw, but I pivot turning my shield to meet the blow. The strike of the beast in death is as hard as it was in life, but Tempus shields me, a bolt of divine light surges from the air around and blackens the ivory bones as it turns the attack. I move close to the beast and bring my hammer down against its ribs, chipping away a few flakes of bone. I manage to turn with the beast, landing a few more strikes as it tries to claw me with its limbs. I sense a change in its momentum and roll out of the way as it drives its body against the ground in an attempt to crush me. As I recover my feet a wave of darkness passes over me, but I am unscathed. The foul necromancies of a beast such as this cannot touch a servant of Tempus. I charge the beast swinging my hammer in a circular motion to build up speed. The beast swats at me with its claw and I seize my chance. Instead of retreating I push forward and swing my hammer at the carpals of the assailing limb. The shock to my own wrist almost makes me drop my hammer but I hold steadfast, accepting the muted blow against my shield. I stagger a few steps, and my shoulder blazes with pain but my opponent is worse for the exchange. Its claw hangs loosely from the few remaining carpals. I charge in again staying close to its body and strike repeatedly at the damaged rib. The beast tries to crush me again, but I am ready. I pull back, just out of its shadow and strike and the shoulder of its good fore limb. The dracolich rears up and twists its body trying to bite at me with its gaping maw. But this is what I wanted, I use the opportunity to move to the other side of the monster; the side with the shattered wrist and resume my assault.
I am relentless. If it tries to crush me I step back, striking at the joints as they come in range. If it claws at me, I strike the limb. Before long the damaged carpals give way and the claw breaks free from the skeleton, sliding across the ground. It cannot run, for I will find its phylactery and destroy it. No, it struggles vainly, enduring blow after blow until, at last, the ribs splinter and break.
I pull back as the skeleton collapses. Bruised but sound, I call upon Tempus to heal my wounds. A sigh of relief passes from my lips as the pain is lifted. In the back of the hall I find it, a large glass orb that swirls with a myriad of colours; the phylactery, the true essence of the beast. Once more my hammer falls.
This build was designed for low or no magic worlds without devastating critical. In the hands of a weapon master a warhammer has an 20% threat range and an x4 critical multiplier which can make for damaging attacks. The warhammer is also a bludgeoning weapon, which is good as bludgeoning damage is the least resisted damage type. It also allows the wielder to use a shield, since a cleric can cast magical vestments on his shield and armor, it is beneficial for a cleric in a low or no magic setting to use a shield. In addition to being formidable in melee, this character also has full cleric casting to fall back on. Without any magic items, this character took down a prismatic dragon in 2 rounds (storm of vengence, harm) if not for its deflecting force ability (which raises its AC from 70 to 85) he could have beat it in melee combat, without pausing he then killed an ancient red dragon (dragon 34, fighter 20) and an ancient black dragon (dragon 34, wizard 20) who were flanking the prismatic. Without pausing to recast any of his buffs (which hadn't worn off yet) he pummelled a dracolich, 4 baelnorns, a lich/monk and a demilich to death, using only his warhammer and a word of faith (though he did have to recast an extended divine favor and heal himself with a greater restoration after killing the dracolich).
There are a few similar builds in the guild, Hannibal by Firestar Rogue is probably the closest. This build's AB is two points lower, but it has level 9 cleric spells and many more hitpoints. Basically, this build is more deffensive, Hannibal is more offensive. A few of the others I've seen have devastating critical but I don't think that devastating critical is a good fit with this mix of classes, between the weapon master and devastating critical prerequisites you burn up most of your feats, and harm works just as well. In the end I think that this is one of the strongest combinations of these three classes. If you want, you could trade three cleric levels for three weapon master levels and pick up an extra feat and +1 to AB, but I feel the extra spells and higher caster level is better.
Advantages
-Fighter level AB. Unbuffed he has a 43 AB with a normal warhammer, that's around what the typical level 40 fighter would have with his weapon of choice. Throw in the cleric buffs and this character should never miss in a low or no magic setting. -High critical multiplier with a good threat range. He has an x4 threat range and, fully buffed with a mundane warhammer, he averages 184 points of damage per hit (74 unbuffed). In addition to this damage he has a 17-20 threat range with a normal warhammer, 16-20 with a keen warhammer. -Level 9 cleric spells. With 20 cleric levels he's fairly hard to dispel (20% vulnerable to greater dispel) and his buffs last a long time.
Disadvantages
-Low saves. None of his saves are particularly low, but none of them are high either. Against spells, they are okay but a mage who is focused in a spell school will land spells against him. Luckily he make himself immune to death magic (death ward, undeath's eternal foe), mind spells (clarity) and stun and hold effects (freedom of movement). He also can cast heal, greater restoration and mass heal so he is not helpless against mages. He can aslo cast word of faith, which can cause problems for casters. -Low spell DCs. Fortunately, He doesn't need to rely on any spells with DCs. Though a nice implosion of hammer of the gods (gotterdamerung for short?) would be nice.
Bone Breaker
Race Human
Alignment Any
Base Attribute STR 15 DEX 13 CON 14 WIS 14 INT 13 CHA 8
I chose travel and trickery domains under the assumption no permahaste items were available. If you can get permahaste items, then war domain (Aura of Vitality) is a better choice than travel. _________________ Two wrongs don't make a right but three lefts do.
Finally! A Cleric build for those of us who hate playing Clerics. Now this I can do.
Question: what do you lose by going 17/4/19? _________________ Got Hommlet? World of Greyhawk Action Server (with 1/2 price ales on Mondays!)
Ariel, Ookla, RIDE!
undead eternal foe
Yeah, I see that. I actually took the time this time to read the description. He actually makes the very suggestion I suggested. I'm going to have to agree with Mith that the 20 Cleric levels are better than 19WM levels. Again, this is a strong build. Too bad there's not a Dwarf variant. _________________ Got Hommlet? World of Greyhawk Action Server (with 1/2 price ales on Mondays!)
Ariel, Ookla, RIDE!
Mith,
Great intro - always a pleasure to read your write ups.
Nice to see a bludgeoning weapon featured in a build. I don't recall having seen a warhammer-focused Weapon Master before (I'm sure there are others though) and it's a great use of the Weapon Master's extended crit range.
Nice point in obtaining Epic Weapon Spec with only 4 levels of Fighter. I think that most people forget this is possible, so I wanted to give it a specific mention.
All in all, a great melee cleric....I LOVE IT!
Kaliban. _________________ "Where there is life, there is hope." - Grover
You only need 17 levels of cleric for all cleric spells, including undeath's eternal foe. It's really the dispelling factor that makes a difference. Still worth the cleric levels in my opinion though. A very nice build...I'll have to try this one out. Now I just have to find another mod to use it in, .
Steve
Edited By Stravinsky00 on 06/01/05 19:15
What I like about this build is that it is absolutely playable from ground up and it doesn't aspire to have any of the usual gimmicks, like Dev Crit, SC V, etc. Whether or not he was meant to lock horns with the Undead, I think he is still quite effective all the way across the board.
I have to say that I like this character build as well, it looks extremly versatile and to be a good survivor, which ultimately most cleric/fighter characters are.
You can actually get keen warhammers, simply because NWN didn't implement the keen equivalent for blunt weapons, so they had to just use keen for everything.
What I like about this build is that it is absolutely playable from ground up and it doesn't aspire to have any of the usual gimmicks, like Dev Crit, SC V, etc. Whether or not he was meant to lock horns with the Undead, I think he is still quite effective all the way across the board.
I'm going to wait to see it in the bathing suit competition before I give my score.
Kaliban _________________ "Where there is life, there is hope." - Grover
Quote: Posted 06/01/05 15:43:20 (GMT) -- grizzled_dwarflord Too bad there's not a Dwarf variant.
It wouldn't be too tough to go dwarf. Same stats, but drop CHA to 6 and raise DEX and INT to 14. You would have to play around with the levels and feats pre-epic a bit though,
You would lose out on blind-fight, but pick up 1 skill point (you only have to raise spellcraft to 38), +1 to reflex saves and the dwarf racial feats (the spell save bonus is nice). Personally, because the saves vs. spells are pretty high to begin with, I'd rather have blind-fight (50% concealment is really annoying if you don't have this feat). Besides, I like showing a bit of racial pride .
As for a keen warhammer, I just went by the NWN terminology, which is odd to say the least. Then again many of the "bludgeoning" weapons perhaps should have different damage types. Maces, for example, typically had flanges (slashing) or spikes (piercing) which would act as force multipliers to help breach armor. Many warhammers had elipsoid, tapered or spiked heads for the same purpose. So maybe a keen warhammer isn't that much of a stretch . _________________ Two wrongs don't make a right but three lefts do.
Edited By Mithdradates on 06/02/05 03:05
Hey Mith,
I love this build! I've been using it to stomp around on one of my favorite servers. I generally just fight through everything fighter style and when I get to a boss, I have an Invisibility or Sanctuary in reserve that allows me to buff and bring all of Tempus' might to bear against his foes.
Anywho, I was wondering if you could throw together a suggested spell list for this build.
I love this build! I've been using it to stomp around on one of my favorite servers. I generally just fight through everything fighter style and when I get to a boss, I have an Invisibility or Sanctuary in reserve that allows me to buff and bring all of Tempus' might to bear against his foes.
Anywho, I was wondering if you could throw together a suggested spell list for this build.
Thanks,
King Harbromm
I don't think I've seen Mith around the forums in quite a while.
Steve
What's gained by taking the epic wisdom feat in this build? as far as i know, having 19 wis instead of 18 isn't any kind of advantage.
PS - i'm under the impression that gravedigging isn't really frowned upon in this forum. if it is, yell at me and i'll apologize profusely and promise to never do it again!
Quote: Posted 07/22/07 23:26 (GMT) -- eltrentoro
What's gained by taking the epic wisdom feat in this build? as far as i know, having 19 wis instead of 18 isn't any kind of advantage.
The ability to cast level 9 Cleric spells.
Quote: PS - i'm under the impression that gravedigging isn't really frowned upon in this forum. if it is, yell at me and i'll apologize profusely and promise to never do it again!
No, not at all. Thread necromancy is welcomed here (we've no prejudice against the practice of necromancy). _________________ It's rogue, dammit, ROGUE!!!
o.O i forgot about those, that's embarassing
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o.O i forgot about those, that's embarassing 