Foreword I have done a search on this combo and found that there were none... so I thought why not try this combination and see how it turns out... It seems to be a good, and playable, build. In this build, you get nice amount of spells, which is explained in detail below. Also, this build has decent hide/move silently skills, good amount of HPs and so on... anyway, on to the build.
Story A dark night falls over a bustling town, even late in the night, it remains a hub for trades and all sorts of businesses which are conducted within the walls which are surrounded by thick forest apart from roads that leads to town.
Deep within the lush forest, lays a figure cloaked in darkness. Gazing through the eagle-like eyes, he spots two sentries stationed at the only open entrance into the town with four lit torches. Watching all activity surrounding the town and the only entrance… he spots a guard walking from behind the sentries… This guard was different; this one had distant markings on the armor, signifying a ranking far above the two guarding the gate. Perhaps this unique guard is a high guard commander? The marked guard spoke with authority to the sentries, giving them the orders for the night. The orders were to stand guard and let nothing to come in since there is an extremely important meeting to be undertaken between one of the rich families, which are of those who own the town, and some businessmen that seemed to be rough and dangerous. The commander left after giving the orders… the figure smiled and proceeded to move toward the edge of the forest. Just before he reached the edge, he paused a moment, he kneels over to the ground, inspecting the ground.
“Pathetic, real pathetic… they think they could keep me out with this measly trap... hah! I am going to leave them a shocker around here.” He said as he quietly chuckled to himself.
Once at the edge of the forest, the figure paused and wolf came alongside him, waiting for his orders… The owner gave signal and the wolf knew what to do. At the same moment as the wolf walked out, the figure moved. He passed a tree and the next second, he was gone... apart from new wolf that just walked front of the tree.
After the sentries accepted their orders and stood guard, a lone wolf approached the sentries from forest.
“Oooh, look at what we have here! A Wolf!” The left post guard exclaimed.
“Leave that dog or wolf alone, it could have rabies for all we know.” The right post guard said.
“Naw! It looks like it is hungry!” said the left guard as he looked at the wolf, “Here boy, aren’t you hungry?”
The left sentry tosses a meat that was packaged inside his pouch near where the wolf is. The wolf hungrily ate the meat, as it was eating the meat… a second wolf appeared. Excited at the sight of second wolf, left sentry proceeded to get another meat.
“Ah, second one! I am going to feed you in moment.” He tossed second meat, but the second wolf did not approach where the meat was thrown, instead it inched closer to the sentries.
The right sentry spoke, “There is something funny about this one…”
As if to confirm the sentry’s suspicions, the wolf body started to rip and shred itself apart, a horrible ripping sound of flesh made the one that was feeding the wolf to vomit violently. A form of man appeared where the wolf once stood, “Nice of you to feed my wolf… and now you must die.” Quick as he was, both guards were subdued to silence before they could utter a syllable. “However, your time is not up yet… but soon it will be.”
The mysterious man disappeared into the shadows and crept into the town unopposed and quietly… A guard doing his routine inside the town, minding his own business, bumped into a cloaked figure.
The cloaked figure spoke, “Pardon me master. I was not watching where I was going.”
The guard barked back, “Watch where you are going next time!” The guard bumped into the man hard as if to warn him. The humble man looked back and smiled evilly and resumed his wandering as the guard walked the opposite direction. Few seconds later, the guard started to think, “I don’t recognize that man…” He turned around to stop him and to see who he was, but the man was nowhere to be seen. The guard started to feel uneasy.
After finding his target, the cloaked figure stopped and readied himself for the upcoming battle. He entered into the shadows, shrouding himself with darkness. Remaining inside shadows, he searches out for his primary target. Inside the room just ahead of him, it was full of the businessmen of ruthless origins but none of the families which suited his purpose just fine. He would rather to keep them out and deal with the ones that were here now.
The businessmen talked amongst themselves… unaware of man in shadows, watching them, and waiting for the right moment.
“Where the hell are those stupid people? I have got things to do and killing to do!” said one of the men.
A woman barked, “Shut up stupid, we just have to bide ourselves. Just wait patiently and we will deal with them as we have others.”
All men crackled and immediately the room became dark, black as moonless night. Everyone stood up and stood guard, panic overtaking them.
“What the hell?”
“What is this?! Are they attacking us?!?”
“Ah! Something got me!”
“Shut up idiot, that was me. There is something in here with us… be quiet.”
The shadow peered into the darkness, scanning thoroughly for all targets that are in the room… he found good vulnerable spot to appear and do his job. He dropped from the ceiling into the center of the room, breaking the table that the businessmen were sitting around.
“AHH…. Gurgle….” Someone was about to scream but was choking on his own blood.
Afraid of the shadow, the group stabbed wildly at random spots in the darkness, hoping to draw a bit of blood or kill whoever was in there.
Meanwhile, the commander approached where the sentries were slumped over, assuming that they were sleeping on their duty… he proceeded to smack the right sentry. The sentry bowled over, seemly dead… but at closer glance, he was still breathing, just merely knocked out. At his grimace, the high guard proceeded to sound the alarm… but someone beat him to it by loud scream that echoed throughout the town.
“Damn, I left one alive enough to scream.” The assassin cursed as he killed the woman, apparently the leader of this group.
All guards that were within the hearing distance of scream converged onto the building where the deal was supposed to go down. Dozens of guards ran through the hallway and quickly they froze in their path… seeing darkness emanating from the room. Afraid of evil that may lies within… but more afraid of the families who owned the town, they slowly crept into the room, hoping to cut off any means of escape for whatever or whoever may still be in there. Once they entered, the darkness disappeared and the murderer stood in the center, cloaked in shadows… The guards noticed the dead bodies a skewed all around the room. All poised themselves to capture the man who appeared out of the shadows. They closed in, but as quickly as he appeared, he disappeared so fast that the papers flew, following the wind of escaping shadow master. The guards gasped at the speed of the man... they couldn't follow even if they dared.
Later that evening, far into the forest… the shadow master weaved between trees, covering his tracks. However, the high guard was waiting for him in the wide-open clearing. “I see that you were successful at escaping my guards… but you wouldn’t be as fortunate with me.”
“Hahaha! I wouldn’t be so sure of that guard... And I see that you survived the trap… quite a shocker wasn’t it?” He laughed aloud.
The two launched themselves at each others, clashing swords, sparks flying everywhere… When they faced each other, holding off the attacks with their own weapons, the shadow master bared his teeth and growled at commander. Immediately the guard backed off and called in for backup that were hiding in the forest. They all were of different races, variety of fighters, wizards and so forth… They converged on the Shadow Master. At same time, the commander changed his weapon, weapon that was fashioned for the high guard only. As quick as the backup appeared, they were struck down with hatred and fury of Shadow Master. The guard stood, holding new weapon, however it was useless due to that the assassin managed to knock it out of his hand before he could put it to use. But there was one thing that master did that shocked guard to his core, he picked up the weapon.
“You can’t do that! You shouldn’t be even holding it!”
“Haha! You are a fool, I wouldn’t dare to come in and do the job unless I was thoroughly prepared! Prepare to die by your own weapon!”
The assassin moved so swiftly, beyond the range of that the eyes can see. The sword plunged into the flesh of the guard… gouging the flesh and meat out through the back.
Gasping, the guard falls to his knee… “How are you able to…” Before he could finish his question, he sagged dead with sword sticking inside. Shadow Master smiled and left...
“Why do we tolerate this evil?” said one of the hiding druid.
"He is a necessity evil, we only tolerate him because he gets the job done and he protects us from ‘Others’." Another druid said as he sets off to return to his group.
Leveling up Notes: ** Can change favored enemy to your own taste. ++ Can replace this with Great Dexterity
NOTES: The reason for taking many druid levels is that it allows you to level up your familiar so you are able to distract other opponents whenever necessary in early stage of character's life. Also it is to get you some shape changes soon as possible.
Also, reason for holding off on taking Assassin is that I wanted to maximize AB much as possible. There are many benefits of taking druid levels. Also, by taking assassin levels, you get nice benefit of being able to have UMD skill.
In combination of all Ranger and Druid spells, you can easily have a lot of spells in your arsenal. If you were to select one spell each, you could end up with 40 spells!
Recommendations: It would be best to select most of the spell that will improve your hide and move silently skills enabling you to be able to sneak with no problem and kill many opponents as possible. It is also recommended that you use spells that can hinder your opponent's movement or any form of harm that can help you with your opponents. There are many spells to choose from, there are some ranger and druid spells that are same, so that can easily free up your spell slot if you want to have more spells, or have more same spells.
Misc Notes: If you wanted to... you can do the same as what the assassin did in story above.... send in companion(with same name as your character) and follow at same time... this may throw off some of your opponents. But this would only work if they do not check your character's description.
Anyway, aside from above... it is possible to boost the move silently and hide skills by additional 3 points, just have to replace two feats and replace them with skill focus(move silently/hide), perhaps Improved Knockdown and Blind-Fight feat.
Also, since you have 41(40) UMD skill points, you should be able to use pretty much all classes spells(from scrolls) and restricted items which you can use to boost your other skills or stats even more. Such as Keen Edge, Darkfire, Meteor Swarm, Gloves of the Hin Fist +4, and so on...
Thanks goes to Kail for helping me to fine tune this build. Any suggestions that would improve this build even more is welcome. Also, let me know what you think of the story as well...
Anuis
EDIT: Discovered mistake with class levels... corrected it. Should have been R21/D10/A9, not R21/D9/A10.
Fixed format - Kail Pendragon _________________ - Epic Character Builders Guild
- Life is but a dream...
- I know more than I am letting on...
-I think, Therefore I am.
Edited By Kail Pendragon on 05/19/06 00:15
That's just too freakin sweet! _________________ Lord and creator of Lunarcy
Looks like a nice RP build! Goob job! I like it. _________________
Quote: Posted 04/26/06 12:05:52 (GMT) -- Ithacan
[...]Harper Scout, the only class so powerful it's capped at five. [...]
It's a cool concept build, but I'm having issues with the AB. 38 is generally the minimum acceptable for a two-weapon fighter. Still, I guess you can always switch to a tower shield if you have problems hitting.
The wisdom bump only really helps you if you're a monk or taking druid to 11. You could keep it around for spell DCs, but it won't help much. _________________ CATS!
Thank you all for comments.
And to Avarielo, you can boost the AB by using UMD skills on spells and items that can help. Such as true strike spell, that will boost your AB by 20, but you can even further it using either cat's grace or battletide, both will boost it by 2 I believe. So it should be possible for you to get around +60 or more.
Anuis _________________ - Epic Character Builders Guild
- Life is but a dream...
- I know more than I am letting on...
-I think, Therefore I am.
Quote: Posted 05/14/06 02:48:06 (GMT) -- Anuis
Thank you all for comments.
And to Avarielo, you can boost the AB by using UMD skills on spells and items that can help. Such as true strike spell, that will boost your AB by 20, but you can even further it using either cat's grace or battletide, both will boost it by 2 I believe. So it should be possible for you to get around +60 or more.
Anuis
Still, AB buffing is common enough that that particular note is nothing special. Overall, the build should be excellent in low magic worlds, but in higher magic worlds there will be a bit more trouble. _________________ CATS!
Quote: Posted 05/14/06 03:02:04 (GMT) -- avarielo
Still, AB buffing is common enough that that particular note is nothing special. Overall, the build should be excellent in low magic worlds, but in higher magic worlds there will be a bit more trouble.
I believe I made a mistake about how much you can boost your AB by.. I think it was supposed to be capped at 20 which true strike takes care of, so using any other AB boosting spells after using TS wouldn't work. Can anyone confirm this?
Anyway, I agree with that it is best suited for low magic worlds.
Anuis _________________ - Epic Character Builders Guild
- Life is but a dream...
- I know more than I am letting on...
-I think, Therefore I am.
Once more I had the pleasure to see this build being born and to discuss it with its creator. I've got nothing else to add. A nice theme build, too bad high lvl rangers do not get HiPS as they should, it would be a real shadow master!
Nice story too!
About AB buffing: true strike lets you hit the cap, but DEX buffing will give you another +6 maximum (from the +12 cap on ability buffing).
Cheers, Kail _________________ To hear the sound of Freedom, many gave their lives They fought for you and me Those memories will always live inside us, and now it's our time to be free
Standing 1 round flat-footed to get +20 AB for 9 seconds ain't exactly a good solution. 38 is okay for most environments, with DEX-gear and spells you can probably max out DEX. Take into consideration that you will often get to strike at flat-footed enemies, and your AB is doable. Not good, mind you. Doable.
Why did you go Dex and not Strength in this build I wonder? You could reach good stealth levels with your ranger buffs anyhow. A build that is mainly Ranger is very often better off going STR-based, except for PvP perhaps.
Glad to see the owner of the guild still being active, 2 builds lately, not bad.
All in all though, it's a good build. FE's may take care of damage dealing problems where sneaks and crits fail. _________________ I see the fear you have inside, you can run but never hide. I will hunt you down and tear you limb from limb.
I run the Pre-Epic Builders guild. Join and share your experience.
Standing 1 round flat-footed to get +20 AB for 9 seconds ain't exactly a good solution. 38 is okay for most environments, with DEX-gear and spells you can probably max out DEX. Take into consideration that you will often get to strike at flat-footed enemies, and your AB is doable. Not good, mind you. Doable.
Doing that is usually enough to take down couple of opponents.
Quote: Why did you go Dex and not Strength in this build I wonder? You could reach good stealth levels with your ranger buffs anyhow. A build that is mainly Ranger is very often better off going STR-based, except for PvP perhaps.
I thought about doing that.. I might will do this build as STR based when I get the chance.
Quote: Glad to see the owner of the guild still being active, 2 builds lately, not bad.
Thanks. I am planning couple more... but most of them probably will be PrC versions. But there are still some combinations that still has not been done but some seems not doable since they lack certain punch, etc.
Anuis _________________ - Epic Character Builders Guild
- Life is but a dream...
- I know more than I am letting on...
-I think, Therefore I am.
i am trying this build and im lvl 7 at the moment, my problems are that i seem to get hit alot because of the light armor and the double handaxe combo doesnt really deal enough damage about 3-7 at the most. do you have any tips to over come this and still remane such a cool build? Joe
i am trying this build and im lvl 7 at the moment, my problems are that i seem to get hit alot because of the light armor and the double handaxe combo doesnt really deal enough damage about 3-7 at the most. do you have any tips to over come this and still remane such a cool build? Joe
Dexers tend to be hard to play in the beginning. There are some tricks you can use, like potions of invisibility to get out of the battle when needed, and you should use traps when/if you can afford it. A shield is good, I usually tend not to dual-wield early because of the AB penalty. Try sneaking up to your enemies so you can at least get the first strike, and remember it's better to run than die (Again Invis potions are good for that) Last, KD'd opponents cannot hit you _________________ "With Europe liberated, the people of the world turned their attention to that old devil, the United States of America [...] We taught that monster of old the true meaning of freedom." Star Wreck
You could also change starting stats to Str14/Dex14. The build isn't really that reliant on Dex since its got built in stealth feats and stealth goodies from Ranger/Druid Spells. Therefore, you go Strength-based and rely on your Cats Grace to cover your Dex responsibility while in light armor. This will solve your damage problem, and allow you to dispatch your opponents in a faster manner.
Also, you could reverse some things a bit as far as leveling. You could frontload pre-epic with Assassin4, as this is your real damage dealer with a potential death stun on your first salvo. It also brings Tumble and Uncanny Dodge, which the build sorely needs pre-epic if he's going to run around in animal furs. _________________ Got Hommlet? World of Greyhawk Action Server (with 1/2 price ales on Mondays!)
It's a cool concept build, but I'm having issues with the AB. 38 is generally the minimum acceptable for a two-weapon fighter. Still, I guess you can always switch to a tower shield if you have problems hitting.