Post/Author/DateTime	Post
duu40 09-19-05, 08:11 AM	I'll be playing in a new campaign shortly, and as it stands everyone seems to have already planned out their characters to fill the party. Seeing as I'm somewhat an extra as far as the combat side of the game will go I was figuring on trying out a spiked chain character. Bounce around tripping things letting the other melee go to town. However the group I play with only use the PHB for character creation, and the DMG for PrC's, so I'm trying to figure out what best I can do with that Any how, I realy I want to try out a dragon disiple. There's a running joke in the games we've been playing regarding dragons, and one of the party members happens to be a descendant of a character that met a sticky end due to the last game. Dragon hunters with a dragon disiple. Yay for flavour. Also the natural +8 str seems nice for a trip character. Well here's what I'm thinking right nows: To meet the critera for dragon disiple I'll throw in a level of sorc, so Knowledge(Arcane) is a class skill, making level 5 the earliest I can jump to disiple. Stats: 32 point buy: Human: Str 17 Con 10 Dex 14 Int 14 Wis 10 Cha 11 Okay all bonus stats to str. The con is a bit irresponsible, but we have a cleric tank and barbarian front liner. I could have had it at 12 with int and dex at 13, but Combat Expertise pays better with 14 dex, and 11 con is the same as 12 con if all my character stat ups go to str. So I boosted Int too (more craft:basket weaving!). Wis 10 to avoid penalty, Cha 11 so I can actually use the sorc spells I have (true strike). human was taken as I would have had to pull up int and cha, no xp penalty, and +1 feat. Progression as such: 01 Ftr 1 EWP:Chain, Combat Reflexes, Combat Expertise 02 Ftr 1/Sor 1 03 Ftr 2/Sor 1 Dodge, Mobility 04 Ftr 3/Sor 1 05 Ftr 4/Sor 1 8 points in Knowledge(Arcane), Spring Attack 06 Ftr 4/Sor 1/DD 1 Improved Trip 07 Ftr 4/Sor 1/DD 2 08 Ftr 4/Sor 1/DD 3 09 Ftr 4/Sor 1/DD 4 Improved Disarm 10 Ftr 4/Sor 1/DD 5 11 Ftr 4/Sor 1/DD 6 12 Ftr 4/Sor 1/DD 7 Power Attack 13 Ftr 4/Sor 1/DD 8 14 Ftr 4/Sor 1/DD 9 15 Ftr 4/Sor 1/DD 10 Wingover 16 Ftr 5/Sor 1/DD 10 17 Ftr 6/Sor 1/DD 10 Cleave 18 Ftr 7/Sor 1/DD 10 Hover 19 Ftr 8/Sor 1/DD 10 Great Cleave and hell if I know what for 20th level trip and disarm early would be nice, but as I have to start from 1st level I feel the expertise is going to pay off the most. Locked gauntlets will have to be my friend for disarm till level 9. Cleave and what have you were thrown in as I have no idea what I want to do at that level, but hey it'll be fun incase we accidently end up in a war again. Now as I understand it, flying is a move action, so spring attack still applies if I use a melee weapon, and I can use wingover to do things like, sweep in, turn, bugger off and land, so letting me do 50ft spring attacks. Fly By Attack lets me take a standard action anywhere in my move whilst flying specifically. I'm not too sure on my reading of the rules. Early on I was thinking of adding a level of barbarian to gain 10ft extra movement, something which would aid the spring attacks, though that'd push Spring Attack to level 6, and Improved Trip to 9. I've got some kind of an idea here but it seems a mess, hopefully you few can bring some elightened experiance to this ;)
duu40 09-20-05, 07:01 PM	Whelp it's over 48 hours guess I can bump this XP Can anyone at all give me some advice or help out? Should I just go with this? Also when you reach level 10 in dragon disiple it says you get the full half dragon template, does that mean your flight speed goes to double your base movement?
Tig the Goblin 09-20-05, 09:26 PM	I've been thinking about a similar build for LG lately. I'm thinking scout, Sorc + Spellsword. Instead of waiting for wings for my flying spring attack, I'm going with swift fly and then fly. Dragon disciple might be added later to give a few extra spell slots cuz I'm only dipping in spellsword. Maybe a lvl of Brb for speed. Character wise, I've got two completely opposite concepts. One is a dragoon style lancer. The other is a goth chain fighter who flys around hooking people with his giant fishhook of doom, then springing way ripping them up. :) Also when you reach level 10 in dragon disiple it says you get the full half dragon template, does that mean your flight speed goes to double your base movement? The double flight speed only applies to creatures large or larger. Medium half dragons don't get them, so the the wings are a DD bonus.
geekboy87 09-20-05, 10:38 PM	nice build
PhaedrusXY 09-21-05, 12:13 AM	Now as I understand it, flying is a move action, so spring attack still applies if I use a melee weapon, and I can use wingover to do things like, sweep in, turn, bugger off and land, so letting me do 50ft spring attacks. Fly By Attack lets me take a standard action anywhere in my move whilst flying specifically. I'm not too sure on my reading of the rules.Uhh.. no. There are feats specifically for that. Flyby Attack and Improved Flyby Attack. They're in the Monster Manual. I'd suggest dropping some fighter levels, and taking a barbarian level or two. Take Enlarge Person as your first level spell, IMO.
X-Codes 09-21-05, 03:46 AM	I'd suggest dropping some fighter levels, and taking a barbarian level or two. Take Enlarge Person as your first level spell, IMO. The problem with Enlarge Person is that, at later levels, hes not a "person" anymore. True Strike is given, otherwise theres Benign Transposition, Slide, and Hold Portal that are spells without somatic components (allowing you to cast them in armor). I'd suggest that after taking the dragon levels, you take 5 levels of Barbarian. Fast Movement, Improved Uncanny Dodge, and Rage 2/day look nice for this build. Also, you can just take Improved Flight and get most of the benefits of both Wingover AND Hover.
Sieylianna 09-21-05, 07:35 AM	Can anyone at all give me some advice or help out? Should I just go with this? The 10 Con is going to kill you. Personally, I'd lower Strength and raise your Constitution. You also want to take power attack earlier, since it's the big beneficiary of your true strike spell. Ed
duu40 09-21-05, 07:56 AM	Ouch, flyby is less likely to be so useful then if I'm stuck with the 30ft speed, I misconstrued it to be like the Half Celestial (ie that a half dragon with wings flys at twice base speed, it just so happens that unless they already have wings as medium creatures, they dont gain any. Though I can understand creatures natrually having wings doing better with dragon morphis than a human) Unfortunatly the only books I can work with are the DMG MM1 and PHB, I can't see improved flight in there =/. For spells, the only issue is my effective caster level is 1, so most spells with duration our out. True Strike is a deffinate due to my combat nature, Enlarge person works on humanoids but I become a dragon as soon as my dragon disiple apothis is compelte, and I never get a chance to change my spell choices. That second spell choice is really irking me, I might just take a social one, but we have a wizard in the part so it's not like I need much campaign based spells. More than likely I'll just be true striking all day. Does barbarian speed add to flight speed? As it stands it looks like flight wont be useful for actual fighting except in rare occasions, but it's still a fun feature. I like the idea of barbarian, an extra 5 levels of d12 HD could help that hit point issue a bit. I guess I wont be getting cleave with the character but it's not that useful later on. Would it be worth throwing a barbarian level or two in earlier? or would the feat hit be too much, I've not done spikey chain before and it seems like every level I wait for feats is really gonna hurt 34 str whilst raging, looks to be fun, especially with some party buffs\ For some reason I didn't even think about true strike and full power attack Oo nifty =D The thing with the con however is we have a barbarian and a cleric taking the front lines, I'm just going to sit behind them with the reach weapon and avoid combat. A lot, but what con would you suggest? Taking out of STR seems detrimental to my efficiancy considering I'm not the one expected to take the damage (reach+caster guarding duty)
Fanged Fremont 09-21-05, 08:58 AM	If all you're going to be doing is tripping, why not take a whip instead of a chain? Or in addition to the chain. Sure you won't be getting any AoO's, but you'll be tripping people from 15 ft away. With improved trip, take your extra attack and disarm the guy, imp disarm not needed. If you want damage, flaming shock and frosty whips would be your friend. If your DM allows Whip Daggers or Mighty Nagiaka (sp?) all the better, but of course those are in some splat books so probably not.
Sieylianna 09-21-05, 05:26 PM	The thing with the con however is we have a barbarian and a cleric taking the front lines, I'm just going to sit behind them with the reach weapon and avoid combat. A lot, but what con would you suggest? Taking out of STR seems detrimental to my efficiancy considering I'm not the one expected to take the damage (reach+caster guarding duty) I've never been in a campaign where the enemy only attacked the PCs standing in front. In addition, in order to get your attacks of opportunity, you have to be in the front line until you're enlarged (which takes a full round). I don't think you're going to be effective if you aren't in the front. One of the things about the point buy system is the 17 costs 3 more points than a 16. You could put those three points in Con and raise it to a 14 at 4th level. That nets you a +2 bonus versus the +1 you gain from your build. Area effect spells hit everyone and your Reflex save will be horrible, that +2 hit points per level could make the difference. I think it's worth it, but in the end it's your decision. Ed
duu40 09-21-05, 07:50 PM	Only thing I ever had against the whip was that I can't do additional damage, and chain is a two handed weapon so benefits more from power attack and base strength. In retrospect I never considered that aditional elemental damage from enchantments would still be applied, but is it optimal using a whip? I mean 90% of the time I wont get base damage in (only PHB weapons) and that takes away power attack and str bonus. There will be times where tripping isn't an option, or I'm unable to do it successfully, and I lose +4 for having a two handed weapon. To me it seems risky, could someone clarify if this is worth going for? Right now it seems very strange to give up combat expertise and range giving me up to 3 AoO a round, with options to damage things that are unarmed that I could trip, or just laying on ablative damage to smaller things Regarding combat in general, I have found that spring attack does wonderful thing for low hp characters, the fighter in our last campaign got some abysmal rolls on his hp per level (averages now ;p ). I think it's a fair arguement with the con. The main reason it ended up so low is because I hate odd numbers in stats ;p What I neglected of course was that con works in retrospect to your levels, and that means the +5 stat points becomes an even 4 and works with the 16 str. Though I'm going to be paranoid the whole time that the +2 differance between me and the half orc will bite me some time, more can be said for 40 hps. So I'll definatly go 16str/13con Thanks for your imput on that ^_^