Buffed AC + 2 Cat's Grace + 5 Bard's Song + 4 Haste + 4 Mage Armor + 4 Shadow Evade + 2 Curse Song ------- 44 Total (45 w/ Dodge)
+2 Protection v. Evil ------- 46 Total (47 w/ Dodge) v. Evil
Spell Selection (castings) (Important spells in bold) Level 1 (5) - Balagar's Iron Horn, Cure Light Wounds, Identify, Mage Armor, Protection v. Evil Level 2 (5) - Bull's Strength, Cat's Grace, Hold Person, See Invisibility, Ultravision Level 3 (5) - Greater Magic Weapon, Gust of Wind, Haste, Keen Edge, Wounding Whispers Level 4 (5) - Cure Critical Wounds, Dismissal, Hold Monster, Improved Invisibility, War Cry Level 5 (4) - Ethereal Visage, Healing Circle, Greater Dispelling, Mind Fog, Summon Creature V Level 6 (4) - Dirge, Energy Buffer, Ice Storm, Summon Creature VI
Other Abilities - Bard Song - Curse Song - Knockdown - Hide in Plain Sight - Shadow Evade - Shadow Daze - Summon Shadow
Shadow Dancer Feats - Darkvision - Defensive Roll - Evasion - Improved Evasion - Slippery Mind - Uncanny Dodge III
Bard Song (inverted = curse song) +2 AB +3 Damage (bludgeoning) +5 AC +2 Fort +2 Reflex +3 Will +20 HP +4 Skills
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My intent with this build was to take up a spot in the search engine that hadn't been filled yet (Bard/Shadow Dancer/Harper Scout). Obviously the build would be better off without the Harper Scout level , but it seems to work with just that 1 level. I had originally considered making a Dex build out of this with 5 HS levels, but without sneak attack and not enough ability boosts to get strength up for Dev. Crit in addition to Dex for Epic Dodge, the build would have been just one more low damage Dex build of which there are way too many.
As it is, the Tenebrous Harper Minstrel doesn't deal a heck of a lot of damage, but has a great AB when buffed and taunting, and does 3 kinds of damage with Bard Song singing and his trusty halberd swinging. With 57 fully buffed taunt, he's pretty likely to get the max penalty on his opponent. Not to be overlooked is the 18-20 x3 crit, which, when it lands, can inflict some serious pain. Curse Song and Dirge help a lot too.
His AC may be a touch low, but I like to think that Improved Invisibility, Shadow Evade, and Ethereal Visage make up for that. If enemies do land a blow they take 29 damage from Wounding Whispers. Having 29 levels of Bard also makes his spells pretty difficult to dispel except maybe by some ueber mages.
I managed to make get his HP into the 'fair' range by taking some more CON and toughness at the end of the build.
I apologize for not having a great intro. I've just been a little busy to think up much lately. Maybe in the future.
Edited Title - Kail Pendragon
Edited By Kail Pendragon on 06/08/06 08:52
Like you said, definitely better off without the Harper Scout. You trade two pre-epic feats for Great Charisma, and then take two pre-epic feats in epic anyway. Iron Will is somewhat justifiable, I suppose, but Alertness really isn't important enough to lose out on an epic feat for. Dropping Harper and the two pre-requisite feats and then taking Curse Song and Toughness Pre-Epic would open up two feats, one of which could easily be Great Charisma.
I know, you probably know this already, though, and you pointed out that the build would be better off without Harper. Oh well, one less build combination absent from the list!
Oh, and as for dispelling: Only Breaches and Mordenkainen's Disjunction will strip spells from him. Greater Dispel is ineffective against a caster level of 26+.
Edited By Acothea on 06/07/06 15:54
Quote: Posted 06/07/06 15:53:03 (GMT) -- Acothea
Like you said, definitely better off without the Harper Scout. You trade two pre-epic feats for Great Charisma, and then take two pre-epic feats in epic anyway. Iron Will is somewhat justifiable, I suppose, but Alertness really isn't important enough to lose out on an epic feat for. Dropping Harper and the two pre-requisite feats and then taking Curse Song and Toughness Pre-Epic would open up two feats, one of which could easily be Great Charisma.
I know, you probably know this already, though, and you pointed out that the build would be better off without Harper. Oh well, one less build combination absent from the list!
Yeah, was aware of all of that. Still, I do my best to fill out the ranks, so that every combination returns a match (there are quite a few). It seems like almost any build can be 'forced' if you give them enough strength.
Quote: Oh, and as for dispelling: Only Breaches and Mordenkainen's Disjunction will strip spells from him. Greater Dispel is ineffective against a caster level of 26+.
Ah, very good to know. Thanks.
To be precise 25 caster lvls are enough to be undispellable.
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
As the build stands now, I recommend changing the Alertness feat to level 18. SInce it's not necessary except as a prereq to HS, take it as late as possible and move your other feats up. That way you get the benefit of feats you're actually using a few levels earlier.
I'd also drop Halberd in favor of Greataxe. Two damage types on a weapon is still bugged, so damage resistance to one type will mean resistance to both types.
Also, I'm not sure of this (and haven't tested it), but I think I recall reading that the extra damage from Bard Song is not actually bludgeoning (even though it states it is on the character sheet), but the same damage type as your weapon. Again, I'm not positive about this though.
Another thing I might consider is dropping 4 levels of SD in favor of the other 4 HS levels. Take 4 HS pre-epic and use the HS bonus feat at level 1 for Curse Song. This will give you an extra epic feat to work with (for Epic Prowess, Armor Skin, maybe Epic Fortitude - or, drop Toughness and take that freed up feat as GRTt CON as well as trading the Toughness feat for another GRT CON. That way you end up with the same amount of HPs, but +1 on Fort saves). The 5th HS level in epic will allow you to take your GRT CHA feat.
You lose Improved Evasion and Slippery Mind (SM isn't that big a deal, and since Reflex is your best save, you can probably afford to lose Imp Ev as well). You'll end up with better Will saves if you go Bard 16/HS 4, or better Reflex and Will saves if you go Bard 12/SD 4/HS 4 in pre-epic.
Another thought occurs to me as well: what armor is this character intended to wear? If it's anything with arcane spell failure involved, then you'll need Still Spell to cast Wounding Whispers and Haste, unless you think you'll have the chance to do the 'strip off the armor to cast' dance before every battle (although I'm coming to believe that Extend Spell is much more useful for a Bard build).
Another tweak I'd suggest re the pre-epic feats: move Iron Will later as well, as your high save is Will anyway. So, at level 15 take Iron Will and at level 18 take Alertness.
Also, once you get Evasion from SD level 2, take Bard again, saving the next 2 SD levels for character levels 19 and 20. The SD levels 3 and 4 bring very little to the build, so more Bard earlier on is better to increase your spell durations, power, and Bard Song quicker.
*edited* spelling.
Edited By Cinnabar Din on 06/07/06 16:32
Quote: Posted 06/07/06 16:20:29 (GMT) -- Cinnabar Din
As the build stands now, I recommend changing the Alertness feat to level 18. SInce it's not necessary except as a prereq to HS, take it as late as possible and move your other feats up. That way you get the benefit of feats you're actually using a few levels earlier.
I'd also drop Halberd in favor of Greataxe. Two damage types on a weapon is still bugged, so damage resistance to one type will mean resistance to both types.
Also, I'm not sure of this (and haven't tested it), but I think I recall reading that the extra damage from Bard Song is not actually bludgeoning (even though it states it is on the character sheet), but the same damage type as your weapon. Again, I'm not positive about this though.
Another thing I might consider is dropping 4 levels of SD in favor of the other 4 HS levels. Take 4 HS pre-epic and use the HS bonus feat at level 1 for Curse Song. This will give you an extra epic feat to work with (for Epic Prowess, Armor Skin, maybe Epic Fortitude - or, drop Toughness and take that freed up feat as GRTt CON as well as trading the Toughness feat for another GRT CON. That way you end up with the same amount of HPs, but +1 on Fort saves). The 5th HS level in epic will allow you to take your GRT CHA feat.
You lose Improved Evasion and Slippery Mind (SM isn't that big a deal, and since Reflex is your best save, you can probably afford to lose Imp Ev as well). You'll end up with better Will saves if you go Bard 16/HS 4, or better Reflex and Will saves if you go Bard 12/SD 4/HS 4 in pre-epic.
These thoughts had occured to me as well. It seemed to me that improved evasion would be better than any additional feats I might have taken from the HS bonus feat. Are my saves not high enough for Improved Evasion to be useful to this character? I'm still not clear on what saves scores are optimal, I guess.
In my preliminary builds I did take 4 HS pre-epic as you suggested and took Curse Song with that, but again, the Improved evasion seemed too important.
I intended to use Studded leather with this build. If I were to swap 4 SD levels for HS levels, I would use leather armor, because of the stacking Cat's Grace. In my experience the occassional failure caused by such light armors is a risk worth taking. But if I have room for a still spell feat, that might work as well.
Cin, I'm looking closely at your suggestions and not seeing where I'd have room to take another Great Con feat.
I have 3 epic feats from Bard levels: Curse Song, Lasting Inspiration, and ESF: Taunt.
I use HS 1 to take Great Cha I.
My other Epic feats are as follows: - EWF: Halberd - Great STR I - IV (4) - Toughness - Great CON I That's all seven epic feats I get normally.
I would take another Great Con I if I could even it up with another point of Con, but there's no way to do that as you suggest.
Maybe if I take Harper Scout all Epic, and take 2 Great CHA with that, I could redistribute my earlier CHA boost (level 12) to CON later and then get a 2nd Great CON in place of toughness. This wouldn't be bad really.
But I'm still not convinced its worth all that to give up Improved Evasion. That feat just seems too valuable to me.
Edit: Not to mention I get 8 more skill points and 8 more potential hp from taking 10 SD v. 5 HS levels.
Edited By Ythaniel on 06/07/06 17:26
Quote: Posted 06/07/06 17:24:20 (GMT) -- Ythaniel
Cin, I'm looking closely at your suggestions and not seeing where I'd have room to take another Great Con feat.
I have 3 epic feats from Bard levels: Curse Song, Lasting Inspiration, and ESF: Taunt.
I use HS 1 to take Great Cha I.
My other Epic feats are as follows: - EWF: Halberd - Great STR I - IV (4) - Toughness - Great CON I That's all seven epic feats I get normally.
I would take another Great Con I if I could even it up with another point of Con, but there's no way to do that as you suggest.
My bad. I was looking at the Curse Song feat you take on Bard 23, thinking it was a regular feat level. However, as it stands, you could take a GRT CHA feat there. POssibly there's a way to work this out, but I;m not sure. I'll see if I can come up with anything.
Quote: But I'm still not convinced its worth all that to give up Improved Evasion. That feat just seems too valuable to me.
Improved Evasion only kicks in on a failed Reflex save and since Reflex is your highest save, I'm not sure it's necessary.
Quote: Edit: Not to mention I get 8 more skill points and 8 more potential hp from taking 10 SD v. 5 HS levels.
True, but 8 HPs is no big deal. 8 skill points is, IMO a bigger loss, but it can be recovered from Concentration perhaps. I also notice you've no UMD at all in the build. I highly recommend that skill (I'd give up Concentration for it).
I'm shocked this build lacks UMD skill points. This would enable you to use all kinds of nice restricted gear (monk robes, etc.).
Yeah, I guess I ignore UMD because I'm trying to build without assuming there will be any kind of equipment to help. Feel free to redistribute points to UMD as you wish. I definitely would if I were playing in the OC or Infinite Dungeons.
Edit: It looks like I misunderstood Evasion and Improved Evasion. I guess its not worth all that much considering my reflex save is pretty good. I'll post an alternate build (rebuild) here in a bit.
+3 v. Traps (Harper Scout feat & Uncanny Dodge II) +6 v. Spells (spellcraft)
I also noticed that by taking 16 Bard with less than 15 Charisma pre-epic, I won't be able to cast any Level 5 or 6 spells until I get Great Charisma II from the Harper scout. I guess its possible to live without them though, heh. The alternative would be to take all 6 SD levels pre-epic, but then I would lose 1 AB.
That feat just seems too valuable to me.
Still, I do my best to fill out the ranks, so that every combination returns a match (there are quite a few). It seems like almost any build can be 'forced' if you give them enough strength. 