Shock Trooper Tactics

[Mildly Inept]

My Paladin recently reached 6th level, and I took the Shock Trooper feat because I like doing damage. Between 22 Strength (20 STR + Gauntlets,) Divine Might, Charging Smite, Shock Trooper, and a +1 Greatsword, I can do (2d6+42)x2 damage at the cost of -12 AC. (-10 from Shock Trooper, -2 from the charge.) However, I also like living, and most of the big scary things that require such a vicious smiting are going to put down a world of hurt if I miss or fail to kill them or if their buddies are around to avenge them, since my post-charge AC will be really low. How can I be an effective Shock Trooper without getting swiftly killed and becoming literal dead weight for the party?

[OgresAreCute]

If you get Karmic Strike and/or Robilar's gambit (both feats) you can kill them back when they kill you. Neither will likely be available to you atm though.

[emeraldstreak]

If your DM is the type to punish Shock Trooper, you have the following options:

- drop Shock Trooper and use other things to boost damage

- boost AC so much the penalty doesn't matter

- use non-AC defenses

The first solution (for a paladin) will mean getting more out of damage dice with magic like Greater Mighty Wallop, or multiclassing into martial initiator. The second will require the likes of Force Screen and creating access to Alter Self. The third would be getting rich enough for a Starmantle Cloak and multiclassing for Evasion (and using a mithral breastplate), or getting high DR, or getting damage immunities. By the way, the cheapest option of these is to increase reach and hope for the best.

[Mike Miller]

If you can obtain equipment that provides you miss chance ( blur, blink, etc), you could survive better. If you have a caster who can buff you before battle with such effects, you could survive better, too. In the long run, miss chance may prove more beneficial than AC. However, this may vary from group to group. For example, if your DM uses more caster type enemies than bruisers, you won't have as much to worry about with regard to being hit.

[sleepyphoenixx]

Miss chance is definitely the way to go. It's the only thing that's really cost effective.
The one downside of that strategy is that most forms of it are bypassed by Blindsight and True Seeing (mostly high level fiends, oozes, some plants), which is something you'll have to be wary of.
On the upside it's a lot cheaper than keeping up AC at high levels and works just fine against touch attacks and incorporeal enemies.

Also get a reach weapon. It's not a perfect solution, but at least you'll get an AoO if something without reach tries to come after you. Even better if you have Improved Trip or Stand Still (XPH). Combine that with Enlarge Person to increase your reach even more.

You can improve on that by gettting Robilar's Gambit + Evasive Reflexes so you can break full attacks by stepping out of range as an AoO.

A short-term solution is the Shadow Cloak (DotU, 5,500gp) which lets you teleport 10ft as an immediate action in response to an attack twice a day.
Anklets of Translocation (MIC, 1,400gp) can also work. They're swift action activated though, so you'll have to use them preemptively to teleport out of full-attack range after your charge before you know if you'll actually need to.

For a more offensive solution get pounce. Less chance of something in your melee range still being alive if you get a full attack at the end of your charge.

[Elkad]

Get Sudden Leap, Hustle, or some other Swift action movement buff.

Charge in. If they don't die (or they do but their friends are too close), use your Swift to get clear.
Also handy for lining up your Charge, either planning for your next target, or for the current one if the battlefield isn't cooperating and you want to live dangerously.

[BlackOnyx]

Get Sudden Leap, Hustle, or some other Swift action movement buff.

Charge in. If they don't die (or they do but their friends are too close), use your Swift to get clear.

I like this line of thought. Anklets of Translocation (1400gp) let you dimension door 10' 2x a day as a swift action (line of sight/effect required). Run, swing, and "poof!" could certainly be an effective strategy.


A casting of Delay Death by an ally could also give you some peace of mind if straight hp loss is your greatest fear. The Troll Blooded feat is good for similar reasons, but it's probably a bit late to consider in your PC's case.

[Kelb_Panthera]

You survive by not over-committing with PA. BTW, you can't take a penalty that big. PA limits the penalty you can take to a value equal to or less than your BAB and shock trooper doesn't release that. Stop at 5 then push maybe 3 of that onto your AC and go about your day. Yeah, you don't hit like a freight train that way but you don't get run over by one either.

[Mildly Inept]

Derp. Sorry about that. This is what happens when you post at 5 AM before going to work.

Running the numbers again, with that in mind, I should be able to do 2x (2d6+44) damage, with 2d6+10 from a +1 Greatsword at 22 STR, +18 from the charging smite, +4 from Divine Might with 18 CHA, and +12 from the Shock Trooper Power Attack. I have no idea where I got the 42 from. So more damage with less AC penalty. No complaints there, though that still doesn't leave my AC in great shape.

Anyway, I think you're right that the Golden Rule for a charger build is Don't Be Stupid, but it's always nice to take extra precautions. I'm discussing with the wizard ways he can help keep me alive. In a few levels, he'll PrC into Incantrix, which should open up some interesting options. (I'm going for Fist of Raziel.) I like some of the suggestions here, particularly the Anklets of Translocation, which are affordable with my current budget. Also agree that the best defense is a good offense because the enemy can't hit you if he's dead. Was thinking about taking Ancestral Weapon as my next feat and using it to upgrade my weapon to Valorous, which would lead to a x3 on the charge when combined with Rhino's Rush. What would be the best way to get Pounce? Unfortunately, a multiclass into Lion Totem Barbarian is out due to alignment restrictions...

Thanks to everyone for all the help.

[Darrin]

What would be the best way to get Pounce?

Travel Devotion is somewhat painless, either by taking the feat or a Cloistered Cleric dip to swap out the Travel domain (Draconic deity Io or the Asgardian Pantheon are good picks). There's also a guide: Ways to get Pounce or Free Movement. Which is to say, outside of SLT Barb there isn't much that gives you actual "Pounce (Ex)", but there are a variety of methods to get movement outside of a full-round action, which is similar to getting Pounce.

[sleepyphoenixx]

Travel Devotion is somewhat painless, either by taking the feat or a Cloistered Cleric dip to swap out the Travel domain (Draconic deity Io or the Asgardian Pantheon are good picks). There's also a guide: Ways to get Pounce or Free Movement. Which is to say, outside of SLT Barb there isn't much that gives you actual "Pounce (Ex)", but there are a variety of methods to get movement outside of a full-round action, which is similar to getting Pounce.

The problem with free movement abilities is that they don't count as a charge, so they don't trigger Shock Trooper.
Well, unless you combine them with Battle Jump (UE). Every movement is a charge with that one as long as you have enough ranks in jump (and maybe some form of Spider Climb/Wall Walking).

[Mildly Inept]

You can cast Rhino's Rush and Devastating Smite on the same turn, right? If so, that gets us to (2d6+62) x 2 damage or 138 average, if my math is right. The goal is to be roughly competitive with the Lion Totem Barb/Fighter build, so any ideas on how to keep up over the coming levels would be welcome. I've looked at Leap Attack, but the whole "jumping is not a class skill and I'm wearing heavy armor" thing seems to be an obstacle. Another thing that would be useful are some rough benchmarks as to when I should have what items. I have a pretty good idea of the items I want, but am less certain as to what order to purchase them in. By what level should I aim to have a valorous weapon, or an item imbued with permanent Lion's Charge, etc.?

[Darrin]

You can cast Rhino's Rush and Devastating Smite on the same turn, right?

No. They are both swift actions to cast, and you only get one swift action per turn.

There are a few methods to cast two swift actions per turn, though. Easiest would probably be a Glyph Seal (1000 GP, MIC) keyed to a pocket, spell component, or ammunition that can be activated as a free action. Ruby Knight Vindicator's Divine Impetus would also work, but that could take awhile to get working. The Mobile Spellcasting feat also allows a second swift-action spell to be cast as a standard action, but that sorta rules out charging without additional action economy shenanigans.

I've looked at Leap Attack, but the whole "jumping is not a class skill and I'm wearing heavy armor" thing seems to be an obstacle.

Martial Study: Wolf Fang Strike can add Jump as a class skill (a gauntlet, which is included in all medium/heavy armor, can be used as an offhand weapon, or add armor spikes for 50 GP). A dip into either Warblade or Fighter could also get you some ranks in Jump.

Another thing that would be useful are some rough benchmarks as to when I should have what items. I have a pretty good idea of the items I want, but am less certain as to what order to purchase them in.

That's going to vary quite a bit from group to group, DM preferences, and how exactly your WBL shakes out... which is difficult for random forum posters to predict.

By what level should I aim to have a valorous weapon, or an item imbued with permanent Lion's Charge, etc.?

Again, difficult to predict, but going by the Ancestral Relic feat or the Kensai PrC... you can get the equivalent of a +2 weapon around ECL 7ish. You're mostly a meatbag, so a good chunk of your WBL should be invested in your primary weapon... assuming 25% to 50% of your WBL goes to your primary weapon, that's still around 7th-8th level. However, that's assuming your DM disburses loot roughly in the same ballpark as WBL.

As for a use-activated item of lion's charge... 2 (spell level) x 4 (caster level) x 2000 x 4 (1 round duration) = 64,000 GP would be the DMG recommendation. Based on the WBL chart... I'd say 15th level, maybe 14th at the earliest.

If you restrict the item to a particular holy order or specific faith/alignment, that could knock the cost down by 30%, so 44,800 GP. That's about 50% of WBL at 12th level, 40% of WBL at 13th, or 30% of WBL at 14th.

[tiercel]

By what level should I aim to have a valorous weapon, or an item imbued with permanent Lion's Charge, etc.?

Rhino’s Rush you can cast yourself, but given your limited spellcasting, you can just as easily fit it in a wand that you put into a weapon chamber. If you can buy a wand from a cleric with the Wrath domain, then you are looking at CL 1 * spell level 1 * 750 = 750gp; worst-case, you have to buy one made by a paladin or ranger and so you have to eat CL 2 -> 1500gp.

For 50 double-damage charges, I’d say that’s well worth it.

—

More generally, you want to ask how important it is that you have a couple of HUGE charges a day vs having slightly less huge, but more frequent, charges per day. I don’t know how much freedom you have to adjust your build at this point, but unless bull rushing is coming up a lot in your campaign, having something instead of Shock Trooper would save you *two* feats.

Extra Smiting gets you +2 smites/day, and the Mighty Smiting weapon property (+1 cost) gets you another +1 smite/day AND +hit/damage when you smite. How much you want to focus on smiting depends on whether you can count on most of your significant foes to be Evil and whether you are going to PrC/multiclass out of Paladin.

If you are worried about targets surviving your charging smites, or need something cool to do when you can’t charge, Stunning Surge (MIC, +1) or especially Sudden Stunning (DMGII, 2000gp, really almost too good) give you a way to apply Stun to your attacks that is Cha-based.

[StreamOfTheSky]

Heedless Charge tactic is almost an after thought for me when I take Shock Trooper.

Play a Goliath or some Large race, or if the DM allows it, you can qualify and use it while enlarged (or wildshaped into a large creature, etc...) and take the Knockback feat.
Shock Trooper's other two tactics let you bull rush foes diagonally and let you knock other foes prone if you bull rush someone into them. With Knockback, you can literally go bowling, and it's really fun.

I mention this because it is also an easy way to mitigate the AC loss of Heedless Charge: Knockback feat to bull rush the foe away after hitting him, so he can't retaliate as harshly. Standard reach weapon + AoO tactics (trip, stand still, hell just knockback again...) help foil his attempts to charge back into melee with you, and if you knock his friends prone with his careening carcass, they'll need a move action to stand up and also will have difficulty getting into melee with you.
But you do need to be Large to qualify for / use Knockback.

[Mildly Inept]

Bought two glyph seals to store Devastating Smite + A Wand of Rhino's Rush before the next adventure. Also took Curse Breaker alternate class feature because we're planning on attacking a werewolf lair next week after we clear out an abandoned mage's tower tomorrow. Will report results. Keeping Shock Trooper because I'm PRCing into Fist of Raziel, which gets me more smites than a normal Paladin.

BTW, is Sudden Stunning legal or was it erratted? I'm getting mixed messages from the internet.

[tiercel]

BTW, is Sudden Stunning legal or was it erratted? I'm getting mixed messages from the internet.

Ask your DM, really: the general argument against Sudden Stunning is that the MIC’s Stunning Surge “was intended to replace it” (an argument usually made as the DMGII property is pretty arguably strictly superior for a lower cost).

Formally, that may not be true as the MIC version has a different name, but you want to make sure that your DM is okay with the power level of Sudden Stunning vs your game’s encounters and compared to the power level of other PCs. (Also, consider whether you want every intelligent weapon-using melee foe with a decent Cha to potentially have one, ‘cos it is cheap and effective for a build of that kind, and what’s good for PCs can be more devastating in the hands of your enemies.)

At the least, you may have to consider your DM giving Sudden Stunning a “trial run” in which you agree to eventually/retroactively switch/downgrade it to Stunning Surge if the former proves too much for your game.

[Mildly Inept]

Well, I mean, it's kind of irrelevant at this point because my proud elven paladin died face first in the snow surrounded by the corpses of her friends leaving the town and shrine she was sworn to defend helpless before the hordes of evil before being reincarnated halfway across the continent as a penniless gnome with a bad case of PTSD.

Who would win: four sixth level adventures or at least four werewolves, three hippogriffs, 2 giants centaurs, a giant evil werehawk with powerful magic and an unknown number of high level casters and archers?

The answer would not surprise you!

Not sure what to do at this point. Only possession from my old life I have is my cool greatsword which I upgraded to a +1 Greatsword of Sudden Stunning but I mean, y'know, gnome... Plus I'm thinking about respeccing for plot purposes because the build was meant to represent a proud, fearless, and headstrong knight of Corelleon and not a psychologically broken gnome.

[ExLibrisMortis]

A two-level dip in Ordained Champion would let you smite with your Turn Undead uses, which gets you more uses than Fist of Raziel. OC Smites aren't limited by alignment, and apart from being based on turning level, they function in all respects as Smite Evil. Useful to have on a smiting build. Though I suppose that's moot at this point.


Gnome-wise, the obvious choices are (a) quest to become your old elven self again and (b) roll up a Shadowcraft Mage and destroy the werewolves with extreme prejudice. Option (c) would be to replace the gnome as well, and that could get rid of the werewolf plot altogether, if you want.

[EldritchWeaver]

Who would win: four sixth level adventures or at least four werewolves, three hippogriffs, 2 giants centaurs, a giant evil werehawk with powerful magic and an unknown number of high level casters and archers?

The answer would not surprise you!

Wait, this is not a TPK? I AM suprised!

[Mildly Inept]

No, it was a TPK. Hence the dying face-first in the snow surrounded by the corpses of her friends thing. We have no idea who reincarnated us and don't have a penny to our names. We were allowed to keep one worldly good from our previous lives and that's it.

Planning on respeccing as a Ruby Knight Vindicator because my paladin doesn't feel worthy of serving Corelleon anymore due to catastrophically failing her oath to defend the town, not being an elf, and a bunch of backstory-related psychological issues + feeling close to the Lady of Death because, y'know, she died. (Might substitute an appropriate elven death deity with DM's permission, though I don't know if there is one.) Might go into Prestige Paladin if she gets her mojo back, returns to her original form, and feels worthy of being a Paladin again.

edit: This is now a gnome Ruby Knight Vindicator thread.

Stats:
16 STR 13 DEX 18 CON 12 INT 13 WIS 18 CHA (Formerly 18 STR, 15 DEX 16 CON 10 INT 13 WIS 16 CHA as Wood Elf)

Flaws are allowed.

[Ramza00]

Wouldn't this work? (Someone double check my work ... please... but also remain kind.)

• Wand Chamber so you can use a wand inside of a weapon. (Dugeonscape)
• Perhaps Mouthpick (lord of madness) for whether you can use a wand chamber with a natural weapons, and if your DM says you can't use a wandchamber with a natural weapon mouthpick is a weapon you can do a wand chamber and you can choose to wield a mouthpick instead of a bite attack and you can wandchamber your mouthpick.
• Drakeensteed (Dragon Magic) is a 4 HD flying mount with the dragonblood subtype. Aka you fly something that looks like a dragon but is technically an animal.
• Paladin has a 5th level (Dragon Magic) variant option where you can choose a Drakeensteed as your mount but your Drakeensteed does not possess the ability to command animals. I say this is a bargin for while there are much better mounts (that you could upgrade to) they take feats, higher levels, and so on. So this is the best 5th level paladin mount. Paladin level 5 instantly boosts that 4 HD animal to 6 HD due to the +2 bonus hit dice. Furthermore the animal is now a magical beast with an Int of 6 (it already had a wisdom of 14 and cha of 12.) Thus this animal has 3 feats (HD 1, 3 and 6.)
• You take the feat Surrogate Spellcasting from Savage Species so you can do body movements typical of an animal in order to cast spells and use magic items with verbal and somatic components. Note you still do not possess the ability to hold wands and other magic items like a human can and thus you can't as a Drakeensteed normally use wands but since you have a wand chamber or wand chamber+mouthpick you can now wield wands even if you do not have hands.
• Find a way to cast from a wand. Such as feats, UMD, etc.
• Use a wand of wings of cover. Due to the Drakeensteed Dragonblood Subtype it also covers anyone 1 person adjacent to it for every 3 caster levels. Aka Wings of Cover protect the human who is riding the Drakeensteed and uses the immediate action of the drakeensteed.

[MaxiDuRaritry]

If you get Karmic Strike and/or Robilar's gambit (both feats) you can kill them back when they kill you. Neither will likely be available to you atm though.

Combine with Evasive Reflexes and some reach (guisarme and spiked gauntlets are a personal favorite), and you can simply 5' step away from anyone trying to hit you in melee. If you have a monk level or sufficient UMD, a sparring dummy of the master would grant you 10' steps. The press the advantage stance (White Raven 5, ToB) allows you to take two 5' steps at once. So any time someone attacks you, make two 10' steps instead of your AoO. You might also think about investing in Sword of the Arcane Order and use some of your paladin spells for mirror image, blink, etc.

[Endril]

I had a character in my party that did the charging smite with pounce, because she was a chaotic good paladin with 1 level in barbarian. I don't know if that helps you now, but that's one way you could do it if you're allowed to make that change.

[ExLibrisMortis]

edit: This is now a gnome Ruby Knight Vindicator thread.

There's a build in my signature. The build uses the half-dragon (battle) template, but for you, stonehunter gnome gives you the [dragonblood] subtype and set your Dragonfire Inspiration damage type to acid, which is good, as it's not often resisted. Stonehunter gnomes don't get the illusion save/DC bonus that regular gnomes do, but that won't matter so much to an RKV.