On the server I play on I've played, everything from Paladins to Mages, to Pale masters to Red Dragon Diciples, but in all that time I've never gotten around to playing a Dex character. There are some infamous people with Dex builds, although Dev Critting Str builds, and Mages reign usually.

So having looked at their lvl and class distribution The things I'm seeing are the 20 ftr/19 rogue/1 Sd, and like 13 rogue/7wm/20 ftr. So I Assume the second has a higher Ab, beter crits and dmg, but gets less feats.

So the race will be elf, and subrace Drow, which gives a +2 cha, and +2 int. The 2 charisma I figure means I can start with 8 charisma and not get a penalty for it on certain skills. It would also be helpful since its an elf not to get the exp penalty from multiclassing, so by keepign the ftr and rogue lvls close by I assume.

Basically I'd like A High ac, so far with Full equip I've gotten a 71 ac, and 81 with Improved expertise. I'd liek Epic Dodge, Improved KD/Expertise. And possibly Self Concelment 5. I've written up the build already, but I think how I put the classes, like when I took them lowered the max Ab by a couple, and might have given him a small xp penalty which is a bit of a pain. Here's the leveling order etc.

1 ftr
2-3 rogue
4-5 ftr
6-7 rogue
8-9 ftr
10-11 rogue
12-13 ftr
14 sd
15 rogue
16-17 ftr
18-20 rogue
21-22 ftr
23 rogue
24-25 ftr
26-27 rogue
28-29 ftr
30-31 rogue
32-33 ftr
34-35 rogue
36-37 ftr
38-39 rogue
40 ftr

Feats:
1:Weapon Finesse, Dodge
3:Weapon Focus: Rapier
4:Knock Down
6:Expertise
8:Weapon Specialisation: Rapier
9:Improved Critical: Rapier
12:Improved Knock Down, Mobility
15:Toughness
16:Improved Expertise
18:Blind Fight
20:Defensive Roll
21:Epic Weapon Focus: Rapier, Epic Weapon Spec: Rapier
24:Armour Skin, Great Dexterity 1
27:Improved Evasion, Epic Dodge
28:Epic Prowess
30:Great Dexterity 2
32:Disarm
33:Self Concealment 1
34:Self Concealment 2
36:Self Concealment 3, Improved Disarm
39:Self Concealment 4, 5
40:Epic toughness

Stats:
Str: 10
Dex: 20 ---- 34
Con: 12
Wis: 8
Int: 16
Cha: 10

Skills:
Disc: 43
Hide: 42
Move Silently: 42
Spot: 42
Listen: 42
Tumble: 40
UMD: 20
Open Lock: 14

Equipment:
Haste robes, Boots of the Sun soul +4, Braces of Armour +5, Ring of the rogue +4 (+4 dex), Ring of The Rogue +4, Amulet of Natural Armour +5, Cloak of Protection +7, Helm with +2 dex, Tower shield +5, Rapier +5

Ab with equip: +50/+45/+40/+35
Ac With Equip: 70
Ac with Equip and Improved expertise: 80

I think I might have mucked up on the SC, will have to make sure the way I did it was possible. Also I think that i get a Xp Penalty, and loose some AB, possibly for taking SD pre-epic?

So my question is with this build can I improve my AC, and or AB?

Edited By Almalith on 08/14/05 08:54

No wonder you want to play Drow on that server if you get +2cha and +2 int as subrace bonus with no penalties!
With a normal elf build you would have to go cha 8 and int 14 and drop one of your skills.

From a quick look, the feats seem to be right.

You can improve the AB, like you said, by taking the SD lvl in epic lvls. A ftr10/rogue10 has BAB 17, while your build has BAB 16. This means you have to take your fifth fighter bonus feat before epic (take disarm) and get your epic fighter bonus feats later than you do now.

You don't have to change your leveling order much to avoid xp penalty. And from what I can see, it won't ruin your feat selection.

If you choose halfling instead of elf, you won't have any problems with xp penalty. You're free to take ftr12/rogue8 with BAB 18, and still manage to get your bonus rogue feats in time to get epic dodge at lvl 27.
Small stature will give you bonus both to AB and AC, but you can't finesse Rapier. The epic fighter bonus feats will also come relatively late if you go ftr12/rogue8.
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Edited By Mick Dagger on 08/15/05 13:39

Take rogue at level 1 for the skil point bonus.
Does your Drow have to be evil? If he can be like Chaotic Neutral, you could swap fighter for Champ of Torm and while losing both specializations, get bonuses to your saves, divine wrath, and avoid xp penalties.

Edited By Unforgettableknight on 08/15/05 21:04

Quote: Posted 08/15/05 21:03:56 (GMT) -- Unforgettableknight

Take rogue at level 1 for the skil point bonus.
Does your Drow have to be evil? If he can be like Chaotic Neutral, you could swap fighter for Champ of Torm and while losing both specializations, get bonuses to your saves, divine wrath, and avoid xp penalties.

He'd also lose 3 feats in a feat strapped build, since CoTs only get a feat every 4 levels after 10. Divine Wrath isn't going to do much with his low CHA, and his levelling already avoids an XP penalty. Plus, he wouldn't be able to start on CoT levels until level 11...honestly, I'm not so sure the +10 saves, while very nice, is worth it.

Steve So that's why everyone is taking Rogue on the first lvl... though I don't think it is that much of a skill bonus is it? Anyway I figured out another Dexterity build, that is after lokign at one posted here, it's a litle different taking 7 lvls of weapon master instead of Shadow Dancer levels, which is kind of unfortunate never the less, there is a lot of true seeing on the server I play on which means it's basically null and void. Also very few peopel take skill points in Spot and Listen, so With a 50+ hide adn Mover silently unless they have True seeing or you get too close your as good as HiPS.

This build gets 2 more ac I think, so 72 fully equiped, landing which translates to 33 Naked ac. he also gains a 58 attack bonus, a crit range of 10-20 and does some more dmg in normal and crit attacks, I think he looses 1d6 sneaks from taking 17 lvls of rogue over 19, and also has an xp penalty, other than that infinately beter. I suppose I could also take Teifling, and be a Human which gives a +2 dex, so i'd have the same 20 dex, and gives the +2 int so saame skills, only -2 dex so 6 dexterity so he'd be really ugly and UMD would get hit pretty hard.

Anyway the build is thus

LVL: Class: Skills: Feat:
1 Fighter Dodge, WF
2 Rogue
3 Fighter+$ Expertise, Mobility
4 Fighter
5 Fighter$ WS Rapier
6 Fighter+ Spring Attack
7 Fighter$ Whirlwind Attack
8 Fighter
9 WM+ Weapon Finesse
10 WM
11 WM
12 WM+ KD
13 WM
14 WM
15 WM+ IKD
16 Rogue
17 Rogue
18 Fighter+$Improved Expertise, Improved Critical
19 Rogue
20 Fighter
21 Fighter+$ EWF, Great Dex 1
22 Rogue
23 Fighter
24 Fighter+$ EWS, Great Dex 2
25 Rogue
26 Rogue
27 Rogue+ Great Dex 3
28 Rogue
29 Rogue# Improved Evasion
30 Rogue+ Great Dex 4
31 Rogue
32 Rogue# Defensive Roll
33 Fighter+ Epic Dodge
34 Fighter$ Epic Prowess
35 Rogue
36 Rogue+# Great Dex 5
37 Fighter
38 Rogue# Skill Mastery
39 Rogue+ Great Dex 6,
40 Fighter$ Armour Skin

(note: + means reg feat, $ is Fighter Bonus Feat, 3 is Rogue bonus Feat. That was just because I was making the build on paper rather than In game)

So he lands a 58 fulyl equipped AB, which is a naked ab of +43, and an ab with Mundane Rapier naked 47. And with +12 dex 53 and then with +5 rapier 58. HIs naked ac is 33, ac with +12 dex is 39. And Fully equiped with +5 stuff, hasted, and +4 sunsoul boots is 70. Since i have a +7 cloak i can get it to 72. Since he is 4 dexterity off the maximum dexterity you can get in NwN he is 2 off the maximum ac from dexterity. Which isn't to bad considerign to get the last 4 great dexes i owudl have to drop Epuic dodge and go about 33 lvls of rogue. which owudl Kill the AB, and Epic Dodge is nice.

As for Dropping the Self Concealment, it was mainly because scrolls of Improved Invisibility are pretty common well if you kwnow where to look that is, so that gives me the 50% concealed, also with a 72 ac, and 84 ac with Improved expertise, not to many monsters could hit that since they would need to have a 64 ab to hit that on a 20 and usually ponly high str players or WM's can get their ab that high. So I don't have to worry about being massed by lots of creatures.

Other than that the overall playability is pretty good giving him some decent fighitng capability early on with the fighter and WM taken pre epic for a better AB and easier to lvl early on. The only problem really is the XP penalty I would suffer as an elf. not sure I can give that up unless I took WM post Epic in which case I would loose a fair amount of AB, because I woudl have to have 10 pre epic rogue lvls adn 10 pre epic fighter levels, and also taking WM epic doesn't allow me the Bonus Fighter feats that I uese fo Epic weapon focus, armour skin, epic prowess, and epic Weapon Spec, which woudlnt be that helpful. So In reality Iw oudl rather be stuck with a 20% exp penalty then really mess up the build just to avoid it..
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Quote: Posted 08/15/05 23:55:59 (GMT) -- Almalith

So that's why everyone is taking Rogue on the first lvl... though I don't think it is that much of a skill bonus is it?

It's actually a huge skill bonus. Comes out to an additional 18 skill points, which is quite significant. That's enough to take an entire extra skill and boost it almost halfway up. The first level gives you 4 times as many skill points as any other level, so taking an 8+INT class there instead of a 2+INT class makes a big difference.

Steve 8*4 = 32
2*4 = 8

32-8 = 24

doesn't that mean you get 24 extra skill pts not 18?

-DaMouse
Quote: Posted 08/16/05 12:12:25 (GMT) -- DaMouse404

8*4 = 32
2*4 = 8

32-8 = 24

doesn't that mean you get 24 extra skill pts not 18?

-DaMouse

No. Your first level will have 24 more skill points, but over the entire build, it only comes out to an 18 skill point difference. Basically, you get 3 extra levels worth of skill points for whatever level you take first, and since rogues get 6 more skill points per level, 3*6 = 18. To put it another way, if you have a rogue(20)/fighter(20):

Take rogue at first level - skill points = 8*23+2*20 = 224
Take fighter at first level - skill points - 2*23 + 8*20 = 206

224 - 206 = 18

You can't just look at the first level skill points. When you switch the rogue level to level 1, you are also slightly decreasing the number of skill points over levels 2-40, because those levels now have one less rogue level and one more fighter level. That cancels out some of the extra 1st level skill points.

Steve

Edited By Stravinsky00 on 08/16/05 15:36