[3.5]Hexblade? or something else?

[Socko525]

So here's what I need help with:

I'm currently playing in a campaign as a level 6 Dragon Shaman, and my ability scores are atrocious(my DM makes you roll for your stats, point buying is not an option). So one of the other players(we have 3 including myself) decided to make a new character because he didn't like his current character. This got me thinking about creating a new one myself.

So I decided what the hell let me roll stats and see how I do.(We roll 4d6 and keep the best 3, if you roll triples you get to add the 4th die too.)
So needless to say my rolling was amazing that day:

24/23/17/17/13/11!

And he's allowing it! So basically I have these stats now and I'm planning on killing off my current character to make a new one. Pretty much every book is allowed, so I can make any character class, except he's not allowing duskblades.

I've decided that I want to be human and I'll be starting at level 5. We are also allowed to take 2 flaws at character creation for bonus feats.

The other players are a Ninja and a Druid who is focused primarily on spellcasting and healing. So we really don't have anyone that can deal decent melee damage or anyone with more than a d8 hit die.

So basically I need a character to help take on a melee roll and I'm looking for a min. d10 hit die. I also want something a little more exotic than just a straight up fighter or barbarian.

So basically i was looking at hexblade and wanted help building one(feats, skills, etc)
Although I'm up for suggestions for other classes as well, perhaps swashbuckler?

I did look into the samurai and the knight, but we have a chaotic neutral group that's bordering on evil. So while it would add a different dynamic to have a good or lawful character, it'd be easier and more fun to be chaotic neutral.


Thanks in advance!

[Starbuck_II]

Suggestions:

Hexblade 4/Paladin of Tyrrany 1 (level up till read Pally 3 for

Aura of Despair). ACF Dark Companion for Hexblade.

Crusader 5 (Tome of battle defensive tank class)

Warblade 5 (more offensive tank class)



What are you limited to?

Can you use Pathfinder classes? The Playtest class Magus is a 3/4th version of Duskblade.

Free download at http://paizo.com/store/downloads/pat.../v5748btpy8gte



Another idea:

Changling Totomist 3/Fighter 2 (or Warblade 2, basically any full bab) from there enter Warshaper 4 (if live that long).



Totomist gives soulmelds that boost you a good deal (Spinx claws are decent weapons).

That gives you 2 claws of 1d8 that can be boost to 2d6 (after you get Morphic weapons ability from Warshaper).

[Flickerdart]

Paladin of Slaughter could be a fine fit - your MAD is easily solved by having those absurd stats. Hexblade is just not very good. You could also check out some Incarnum (the only thing better than 24 STR is 24 STR and ten natural attacks).

If you do go with Hexblade, consider dropping a feat on Improved Familiar to pick up a Coure Eladrin. They're fantastically useful creatures that will be much more potent than a regular familiar due to your obscene HP and to-hit.

[The Dark Fiddler]

The Playtest class Magus is a 3/4th version of Duskblade.

Free download at http://paizo.com/store/downloads/pat.../v5748btpy8gte

If you go this route, be careful because it is still a playtest. And submit your critique to them or something, I don't know.

You could also check out some Incarnum (the only thing better than 24 STR is 24 STR and ten natural attacks).

Playing a 20 STR character with 6 attacks currently, I can say that this would be incredibly fun. Whirling blender of death!

If you do this, I'd suggest Totemist, picking plenty of those extra-attack-adding souldmelds, as well as starting with a race that gives natural attacks in addition to that.

[Fax Celestis]

The hexblade is less of a damager and more of a debuffer. I'd point you at something like the barbarian, knight, psychic warrior, or totemist instead. Or something (anything) from Tome of Battle.

[Socko525]

Oh I should mention too that my DM would allow me to use the hexblade "fix":

If you want to boost the hexblade, I'd try the following changes:

* Good Fortitude save
* Curse ability usable 1 + the hexblade's Cha modifier per day
* Curse ability usable as a swift action
* Curse ability does not count as used if the target makes his saving throw
* Ability to cast in light or medium armor and while carrying a light shield or buckler
* At 6th level, the hexblade can cast one hexblade spell per day as a swift action, as long as its original casting time is a standard action or faster. He gains an additional use of this power at levels 8, 11, 14, and 18.

[Joshinthemosh]

As a general rule I prefer Duskblade to Hexblade. And at level six you're one level away from getting no ASP from Heavy Shields. And if you pick up the Knowledge Devotion feat from Complete Champion it starts picking up some great bonuses. On the other hand it's a d8 hitdie. Multiclass with a better HD class? Like Barbarian?

[Hague]

Why not just make it so the Hexblade has a choice of cursing at a distance with a saving throw and cursing with a weapon attack with no saving throw?

[Snake-Aes]

What is your favored play stile? Hexblades have some neat tricks but their spellcasting is rather... weak. If you're fine with that, put your cha at 13 (you can raise it to 14 later) and cap your str and con with the big rolls, and play an Aeshkrau illumian. That gives you +2 to str checks, str skills, +2 caster levels and lets you gain bonus spells from str instead of cha.

If you just want to be arcane melee, a full bab class preparing for Suel Arcanamach + Abjurant Champion can be good. Duskblades are good for that, though almost any class works. (this is my favorite setup for aeshkrau illumians)

[Person_Man]

Standard Hexblade combo is to take Improved Familiar, ride it as a mount, and abuse the fact that it shares your BAB, 50% of your hit points, and has the Share Spells ability. Use Alter Self, Polymorph, and other buffs as needed to turn into various combat forms.

You might also want to consider the Binder or Bard, which are superior non-full caster debuffers.

[Hague]

You could start Paladin, break from Paladin and become a Bone Knight (Pally levels stack with Bone Knight) Buy the Acquire Familiar feat, then take Hex Blade and get a Shadow Servant ACF instead of a familiar. Now you have access to divine magic, can command 8xlevel HD worth of undead and you can stack your undead mount with your familiar for even more fun!

[mobdrazhar]

if you're looking for a Gish build i would probably suggest Duskblade into Abjurant Champion, with dip into Lion Spirit Totem Barbarian for pounce. Take Practiced Spellcaster so you don't lose you spell progression.

[Fax Celestis]

if you're looking for a Gish build i would probably suggest Duskblade into Abjurant Champion, with dip into Lion Spirit Totem Barbarian for pounce. Take Practiced Spellcaster so you don't lose you spell progression.

And he's allowing it! So basically I have these stats now and I'm planning on killing off my current character to make a new one. Pretty much every book is allowed, so I can make any character class, except he's not allowing duskblades.

See if you can make an argument for an adaptation of the CCham Paladin or Ranger ACFs that trades halfcasting for a bonus feat every four levels. I personally prefer it.

[mobdrazhar]

my bad *hides and ponders*

[Hague]

Your DM's ability rolling rules are wonky.

Paladin -> Bone Knight seems like the best choice to me. You get all the crazy stuff, and once you reach Bone Knight 8, you get immunity to damn near anything: poison, sleep effects, paralysis, disease, death effects, fatigue, exhaustion, ability damage to physical attributes, ability drain, energy drain, and death from massive damage. At 4th level, you get immunity to stunning attacks and nonlethal damage. At 7th, you get light fortification and your armor lets you keep fighting while disabled or dying. At 10th you get complete immunity to criticals and sneak attacks. Plus, at 5th level, you get the ability to summon higher hit dice skeletons and zombies with intelligence scores. By 10th level, you can have 40 HD worth of these intelligent undead following you.

[Socko525]

I would gladly do a Duskblade but in a different campaign that we just ended a few months ago I played a duskblade, and my DM deemed them too powerful :(. Hence the looking elsewhere.

I also like straying from the standard classes found in the Player's Handbook. Like I said my current character is a Dragon Shaman and basically all I do is use the Energy Shield aura and let the enemies kill themselves. I have full plate armor and at level 6 we haven't encountered much that can beat an AC 22. So I'm hoping to have a more active roll in combat, but still have a few different options.

I also had contemplated swashbuckler, any thoughts on that?


EDIT: The Bone Knight sounds interesting...I'll have to check that out

[true_shinken]

Your stats are really damn good. Just choose two stats and build around them. A Dex/Int (or Wis) character is pretty easy to build. For a level 5 character, Hit-and-Run Fighter 1/Swashbuckler 3/Swordsage 1 is pretty nice. Swordsage qualifies you for the Shadow Hand feat that adds Dex to damage, hit and run Fighter adds Dex to damage while flanking, Swashbuckler adds Int to damage. Oh, you also get crazy initiative and skills. Get Knowledge Devotion, for a skill based hit/damage bonus. Get two weapons. Go to town.

[Hague]

The Bone Knight is from Eberron. The book Five Nations has the details.

[Socko525]

Wow just checked out the bone knight, if I can swing that I think that's what I'll end up doing, all those immunities plus the undead minions? Seems pretty sweet to me

[Hague]

Yeah, the cool part is that you can co-opt other undead from someone else so if you have a necromancer in your party you get double your undead fun!

[Socko525]

The only thing that I can't seem to find out is weather bonecraft armor has any special abilities i.e. increased max dex bonus or decreased check penalty. It states that the armor is not metal, but I assume if I make a bonecraft full plate, it has the same stat's it would normally have unless I enchanted it otherwise.

[Hague]

I believe you simply choose a specific type of armor and use the normal crafting costs for that type. So you could make bone plate armor, bone mail, bone "hide" armor, bone large shield, etc.

[ffone]

So basically I have these stats now and I'm planning on killing off my current character to make a new one.

This is why I always do point buy. The Darwinian effect.

[Iferus]

How about a Psychic Warrior? With those stats, you can have plenty of power points to vigor up your hit points, while using an absurd strength score to do the damage. You can be an Elan and really tank whatever is being thrown at you. This build also synergises with Crusader dips to cherry pick maneuvers. I would take this opportunity to try some of the spiked chain tripping builds.

[Jornophelanthas]

If you consider playing a Swashbuckler, please bear in mind that it is in most ways inferior to the Fighter. Most of the class features are pretty marginal and rarely useful, with two notable exceptions:
- Weapon Finesse at level 1 (which is more or less on par with a Fighter level)
- Insightful Strike at level 3 (which is a good ability that's hard to get)
The Swashbuckler's main advantage over the Fighter is its greater choice in skills.

The most effective way to play a Swashbuckler that I can think of (outside of prestige classes) is to take 3 levels in Swashbuckler and 3 levels in Rogue in any order, and then to pick the Daring Outlaw feat (in Complete Scoundrel). With this feat, you get the Rogue's full sneak attack progression in addition to the Swashbuckler's d10 hitdie, good attack bonus and mediocre class features. The Rogue's Evasion ability is a nice little bonus. Consider a 4th Rogue level at some later point, because you probably want to benefit from Uncanny Dodge.

Check out the various rulebooks for alternate class features for the Swashbuckler, because the signature abilities Grace and Dodge are not very impressive. If you can swap them for better abilities AND get the DM's approval that the alternate features still count for the Daring Outlaw feat's accelerated progression, you're going to be more functional. Take special note of the Shield of Blades ACF from PHB2.

Put your highest score in DEX (for AC and attack bonus with Weapon Finesse), your second highest in INT (for skills and damage from Insightful Strike), and make sure to give your STR at least a respectable bonus, so that stacking it with Insightful Strike makes an impressive damage bonus. WIS should be your dump stat, and you can decide whether or not you want a reasonably high CHA score for social class skills. CON is not essential to a Swashbuckler build, but you probably should not skimp on it.

Your feat choices are wide open, but here are some pointers. Because a Swashbuckler has no shield proficiency and gets Weapon Finesse for free, consider going for two-weapon fighting instead of two-handed weapons. You might want to pick up the Two-Weapon Fighting feat, especially if you want to trade your Dodge class feature for Shield of Blades. And if you actually want to make use of your sneak attack, consider picking Improved Feint.

I hope this helps.

[true_shinken]

If you consider playing a Swashbuckler, please bear in mind that it is in most ways inferior to the Fighter.

Daring Outlaw. 'nuff said.
You already mentioned it in your post, but this makes Swashbuckler so much better than the Fighter that it's not even funny. If you sport a regular increase in damage over levels, Swashbuckler's class abilities can be pretty nice (I specially like Acrobatic Charge).
Insightful Strike + Craven + Daring Outlaw means 9d6+20+Str+Int to damage at level 20. Very, very good.

[Jornophelanthas]

Daring Outlaw. 'nuff said.

I thought I just did in the part of my post you didn't quote.

[Raendyn]

for hexblade, http://brilliantgameologists.com/boa...p?topic=7412.0

i would recomend a lvl of cleric with 2 good domains, or 1 lvl of conjurer for abrunt jaunt & 1 fighter feat in exchange for scribe scroll & familiar ( not your hexblade's , the wizards)

you wanted melle? go cleric, ordained champion of hextor ( use the 2 handed version of flail, great flail ( it's 1 weapon profesion for the 2 versions of weapon)
combo him with boneknight & you are a moving blender with full bab ( swift divine power...) if you play at FR redknight is your deity!Or dump boneknight & go for w/e spesitge gives you spelllcasting progression. contemplative gives you an extra domain on 1st lvl... but, you can spare 1 more spellcasting lvl, goshiba protector from oriental adventures ( uber cheese ), or a conjurer lvl for the abovementioned reasons.

I return to Hexblade to add a small comment: i've seen him making a good combo with half dragon ( black ) template and blackguard lvls.

[Biffoniacus_Furiou]

The Talon of Tiamat PrC in the Draconomicon is amazing with Hexblade leading into it. For an immediately powerful character go for Hexblade 4/ Talon of Tiamat 10 asap. Get Maximize Breath and Clinging Breath at levels 6 and 9, and remember that you can make a breath cling for multiple rounds in exchange for a longer wait. You won't need to breathe more than once per combat anyway, and at 9th level your cone of acid will do 60 damage initially, then 30, then 15, then 7 if you make it cling for three rounds and maximize it. You'll get immunities, Darkvision, Frightful Presence, heavy armor proficiency, and huge bonuses to social skills.

A more long-term build could go Hexblade 3/ Sorcerer 2/ Talon of Tiamat 5/ Spellsword 1/ Talon of Tiamat 5/ Spellsword 4, or use Abjurant Champion in place of Spellsword. The better spellcasting and spell list makes for a much stronger character later on, just be sure to get Practiced Spellcaster. You can still do the Maximized+Clinging Breath trick with that, and be sure to get the spell Blinding Breath. I'd prefer Spellsword because it doesn't require any feat investment and you get Channel Spell later on which can be used with Cloudkill. Abjurant Champion is good for defensive buffs, but costs a feat to take and this build can't even use (Greater) Luminous Armor which is one of the biggest benefits to using that.


For a Bone Knight, I'd go for Paladin of Tyranny or Slaughter 4/ Bone Knight 10, and probably finish with Crusader levels if possible. Another option would be to go Paladin of Tyranny or Slaughter 4/ Bone Knight 4/ Divine Crusader 1/ Bone Knight 6, and then try to dip prestige classes which grant additional domains and spellcasting to expand your Divine Crusader spell list. I'm not familiar with Eberron religion, but my first choice of domains to pick with Divine Crusader would be Wrath.

[Coidzor]

There's always the setup for the Ruby Knight Windicator, as well.