Arcane "Nasty surprise" Trickster [Archive] - Wizards Community

Arcane "Nasty surprise" Trickster [Archive] - Wizards Community

Post/Author/DateTime Post
Darnek Wyrnin
03-03-04, 06:28 PM Rogue3/wizard2/Assassin5/Arcane Trixster3/arcane Archer2/Arcane trickster5

Feats:
1. Point Blank Shot
3. Weapon Focus
6. Rapid Shot
9. Many Shot
12. Precise Shot
15. Improved Rapid Shot
18. Silent Spell(or other metamagic feat)

BAB: +12
Saves: 7-16-11
Sneak Attack: 9d6
Death Attack: 16+int
Assassin Caster level 5
Wizard Casterlevel 10

Main Tactic:
improved invisibility, Study BBEG for 3 rounds, Imbue arrow with a Area spell like fireball, fire that and 2 more arrows with many shot. Then sit back and watch him get badly hurt or killed by 10d6 from fireball, 9d6 sneak attack, Damage from the bow with it's own magical properties and 3 arrows. And of course He has to make a save vs Death Attack and massive damage. Did I mention the minions? Well, if they survive the fireball, they will learn to keep their distance next time ;)
eudas
03-03-04, 06:36 PM i'll wait to see how many holes people poke in this idea before chiming in much in the way of input. it looks good, but 9 times out of 10 there's usually something that gets forgotten.

eudas
Sisyfos
03-03-04, 07:04 PM Originally posted by Darnek Wyrnin
Main Tactic:
improved invisibility, Study BBEG for 3 rounds, Imbue arrow with a Area spell like fireball, fire that and 2 more arrows with many shot. Then sit back and watch him get badly hurt or killed by 10d6 from fireball, 9d6 sneak attack, Damage from the bow with it's own magical properties and 3 arrows. And of course He has to make a save vs Death Attack and massive damage. Did I mention the minions? Well, if they survive the fireball, they will learn to keep their distance next time ;)

1. Death attack needs to be done with a melee weapon.
2. Imbue arrow and shooting it is a standard action: thus you cannot use manyshot with it. Manyshot takes its own standard action.
3. Ranged sneak attack needs to be done from less than 30 feet away. That is well withing charge distance so you will get retaliated.

You might as well just make an incantatrix and cast:
1. Quickened, empowered scorching ray. =2+3+1=6th level spell
2. Twinned empowered scorching ray. =6th level spell

Damage:
18d6+36d6=54d6 if all ranged touch attacks hit, compared to your build needing to make succesfull normal ranged attacks.

Anyhow, arcane tricksters are nice and your concept has its niche also. It would probably be stronger without the assassin levels though.
Darnek Wyrnin
03-03-04, 07:39 PM Originally posted by Sisyfos
1. Death attack needs to be done with a melee weapon.
2. Imbue arrow and shooting it is a standard action: thus you cannot use manyshot with it. Manyshot takes its own standard action.
3. Ranged sneak attack needs to be done from less than 30 feet away. That is well withing charge distance so you will get retaliated.

You might as well just make an incantatrix and cast:
1. Quickened, empowered scorching ray. =2+3+1=6th level spell
2. Twinned empowered scorching ray. =6th level spell

Damage:
18d6+32d6=50d6 if all ranged touch attacks hit, compared to your build needing to make succesfull normal ranged attacks.

Anyhow, arcane tricksters are nice and your concept has its niche also. It would probably be stronger without the assassin levels though.

1. Doh! Didn't know that. Anyway, we still got touch attacks for it. Assassins who go for ranged weapons gets the short end of the stick then. Wonder why they made it like that... Does it work with thrown daggers?

2. Sure about that? IMO, Fireing an arrow is a standard action, Imbue arrow lets you imbue it and fire it as a standard action. Many Shot lets you fire more then one arrow as a standard. I can see that what you say can be true too, but that would seriously downgrade the arcane archer... Almost to the point that it's not worth taking.

Anyway, even if you are correct, that build can hold his own over many builds and Incantatrix will never be an arcane trickster. Min/maxing with what you got, is what it's all about.

A little antimagic field and the trickster is king. He still have his bow and 9d6 sneak attack :angel:

3. Thats why you're traveling with a party ;)
Darnek Wyrnin
03-03-04, 07:51 PM What I mean is, he still has a whole bunch of skill points, Asassin Abilities, 9d6 SA, Good Saves, +12 BAB, Good with a bow. Just from this alone, he makes an excellent Rogue. but with the caster level from assassin and Wizard, I would be so bold to say he goes far beyond that.
Stoned Golem
03-03-04, 08:18 PM I'm not so sure that a +12 BAB counts as good with a bow. There's nothing wrong with the normal use of Imbue Arrow because an area spell will still go off even if you miss the target, but it's no good for sneak attacking with.

There's nothing wrong with being an arcane trickster. Being able to deal as much damage to a target with a Ray of Frost as with a Fireball is a wonderful thing, and your roguish skills can come in handy, especially when you augment them with spells. You're just not good at anything but touch attacks.

There's nothing wrong with Manyshot. Now that favored enemy damage isn't precision-based anymore, it applies to every arrow, making it very useful for a ranger. However since you'll have an attack bonus of +7 once you figure in the modifiers, you're pretty much forced to either use True Strike before every shot or pray for a natural twenty. Also since only one arrow can deal SA damage it doesn't mesh too well with your strongest abilities.

There's nothing wrong with Assassin. The ability to instantly kill or paralyze your opponents is wonderful, and the spell list doesn't hurt either. There's even a spell that lets you make death attacks with ranged weapons. However arcane trickster is still a +1 spellcasting/level class, and adding Assassin drops your already delayed wizard progression by another five levels, meaning that your fireballs won't even do 10d6 until 20th level, and SR will be a lost cause.

Basically, there's no problem with any of your base classes, it's just that they don't fit well together. It's a classic case of too many cooks spoiling the broth, for lack of a better metaphor. I would avoid mixing Arcane Trickster with either Assassin or Arcane Archer, but that doesn't rule out combos like Assassin/Arcane Archer. With True Strike on your Assassin spell list, a Manyshot of 4 poison-tipped arrows could cut any foe down to size. In fact, you could even imbue an arrow with the Poison spell to increase the fun. Sneak attack damage, four arrows damage, five saves against poison, and one against death or paralysis isn't too bad at all.
Darnek Wyrnin
03-03-04, 10:26 PM A build is never more powerful, then the person who use it...

And I say it's a powerful build ;)

Take it Epic(Arcane trickster), say level 30 and he could take on any class combo one on one, if played right.

Remember that with a 20th level build, you have money for a 20th level character, So to hit isn't really much of a problem. With, let's say 22 dex, basic magic items like Gloves of dexterity+6, a +5 tome, +10 bow(+5), Greater bracers of archery, we now have +18 more to hit.

Like I said, This charackter isn't missing much say a rogue 20(15 BAB) would or Rogue10/assassin10(14 BAB). I think you're looking to much at basic numbers and not what he can do.
Tytalus
03-04-04, 03:35 AM Originally posted by Darnek Wyrnin
Take it Epic(Arcane trickster), say level 30 and he could take on any class combo one on one, if played right.

That's a pretty bold statement for this board, one that usually asks for the label "newbie".

Seriously, it's an ok build, but not a miracle. For starters, there's little synergy between assassin and the rest of the classes. You are certainly better off increasing your wizard caster levels.
Nilaus
03-04-04, 06:01 AM An additional point against your build is that it might be really good at 20th level, but if you have to play that character from level 1 through 20 then it will be ridiculously underpowered during the first 15 or so levels.

It is not hard to make an all powerful 20 level character, the trick is to make a character that is above the average power level on every level 1 through 20
Funny Slaughter
03-04-04, 07:05 AM i dont even agree that its powerful at level 20

a standard trickster sacrifices some casterlevels (2 or 3 normally) to get rogue-skills, sneak attack and some abilities.
his main focus is attacking with ray-spells, some builds also feature ranged or even melee.

anyhow, the ability to penetrate enemy SR is important for a trickster. a fireball with a casterlevel decreased by 10 wont do much good against any enemy at this level.
even SR 14 would grant some chance that this fails...

assassin and trickster do not synergize well in my opinion, impromptu sneak attack is the quasi-opposite of death-attack.

in my opinion a trickster does ok as a rogue with some magic tricks in the lower levels and swings up to a specialized but nearly full caster later on.

if you want to make an effective build using the assassin-PrC i would not use the trickster.
if you want to make an effective assassin-build using the trickster stay away from the assassin-PrC, your death-attack is enervation (etc) with loads of sneak-dice followed by some low-level quickened spell with again a full bucket of sneak.

gs
Funny
rilem
03-04-04, 01:52 PM Lots of Trickster builds give up power at the expense of flavor (mine certainly does) and I'd say this is another one. I wouldn't say it's ineffective -- you've got a bunch of nifty tricks in your bag and an OK BAB. (Don't rely on those 20th-level items, though; unless you plan on picking off commoners your whole career, your target will have similar AC-boosting items).

But the previous posters make excellent points. Your low caster progression will make many of your spells useless against Spell-Resistant creatures. You'll also come up short on dispel checks.

Moreover, your build seems to pass up many of the best features of your respective classes. You're a Trickster who doesn't use touch-attack spells (many high-CR opponents have lots of natural armor but low Touch AC). You're an Assassin who doesn't get Hide in Plain Sight (arguably more useful than invisibility at high levels, when every BBEG can see invisible creatures). You're a wizard who doesn't get 6th level spells.

By way of example, here's how your assassination mission might be handled by a standard Arcane Trickster (Rog3/Wiz5/AT10) capped with Archmage levels.

1. Scry on target with Greater Arcane Sight, to see what sort of magical protections he has in effect.

2. Cast Greater Invisibility, Ghost Form, etc. Teleport in.

3. Cast a Silent True Strike, followed by a silent, empowered disintegrate, Polar Ray, whatever. Assuming Disintegration, that's 1.5(34d6)+7d6. Or pick something else if you suspect they'd make their FORT save.

3a. Cast choice of:
- Quickened, Empowered Scorching Ray (substituting acid, sonic, etc. with Mastery of Elements) if your target is still standing. Another 6d6+7d6 damage.
- Quickened, empowered Fireball (again, acidic) if you want to take out the room.
- Quickened Gust of Wind to scatter the dust left by your disintegrate spell and hamper resurrections.
- Quickened Teleport home.

This is just an example, but generally speaking more caster levels is a good thing. If this build is working for you and you dig it, great, but I'm not sure I'd call it very powerful.
rilem
03-04-04, 03:52 PM bizarre double post

Post/Author/DateTime	Post
Darnek Wyrnin 03-03-04, 06:28 PM	Rogue3/wizard2/Assassin5/Arcane Trixster3/arcane Archer2/Arcane trickster5 Feats: 1. Point Blank Shot 3. Weapon Focus 6. Rapid Shot 9. Many Shot 12. Precise Shot 15. Improved Rapid Shot 18. Silent Spell(or other metamagic feat) BAB: +12 Saves: 7-16-11 Sneak Attack: 9d6 Death Attack: 16+int Assassin Caster level 5 Wizard Casterlevel 10 Main Tactic: improved invisibility, Study BBEG for 3 rounds, Imbue arrow with a Area spell like fireball, fire that and 2 more arrows with many shot. Then sit back and watch him get badly hurt or killed by 10d6 from fireball, 9d6 sneak attack, Damage from the bow with it's own magical properties and 3 arrows. And of course He has to make a save vs Death Attack and massive damage. Did I mention the minions? Well, if they survive the fireball, they will learn to keep their distance next time ;)
eudas 03-03-04, 06:36 PM	i'll wait to see how many holes people poke in this idea before chiming in much in the way of input. it looks good, but 9 times out of 10 there's usually something that gets forgotten. eudas
Sisyfos 03-03-04, 07:04 PM	Originally posted by Darnek Wyrnin Main Tactic: improved invisibility, Study BBEG for 3 rounds, Imbue arrow with a Area spell like fireball, fire that and 2 more arrows with many shot. Then sit back and watch him get badly hurt or killed by 10d6 from fireball, 9d6 sneak attack, Damage from the bow with it's own magical properties and 3 arrows. And of course He has to make a save vs Death Attack and massive damage. Did I mention the minions? Well, if they survive the fireball, they will learn to keep their distance next time ;) 1. Death attack needs to be done with a melee weapon. 2. Imbue arrow and shooting it is a standard action: thus you cannot use manyshot with it. Manyshot takes its own standard action. 3. Ranged sneak attack needs to be done from less than 30 feet away. That is well withing charge distance so you will get retaliated. You might as well just make an incantatrix and cast: 1. Quickened, empowered scorching ray. =2+3+1=6th level spell 2. Twinned empowered scorching ray. =6th level spell Damage: 18d6+36d6=54d6 if all ranged touch attacks hit, compared to your build needing to make succesfull normal ranged attacks. Anyhow, arcane tricksters are nice and your concept has its niche also. It would probably be stronger without the assassin levels though.
Darnek Wyrnin 03-03-04, 07:39 PM	Originally posted by Sisyfos 1. Death attack needs to be done with a melee weapon. 2. Imbue arrow and shooting it is a standard action: thus you cannot use manyshot with it. Manyshot takes its own standard action. 3. Ranged sneak attack needs to be done from less than 30 feet away. That is well withing charge distance so you will get retaliated. You might as well just make an incantatrix and cast: 1. Quickened, empowered scorching ray. =2+3+1=6th level spell 2. Twinned empowered scorching ray. =6th level spell Damage: 18d6+32d6=50d6 if all ranged touch attacks hit, compared to your build needing to make succesfull normal ranged attacks. Anyhow, arcane tricksters are nice and your concept has its niche also. It would probably be stronger without the assassin levels though. 1. Doh! Didn't know that. Anyway, we still got touch attacks for it. Assassins who go for ranged weapons gets the short end of the stick then. Wonder why they made it like that... Does it work with thrown daggers? 2. Sure about that? IMO, Fireing an arrow is a standard action, Imbue arrow lets you imbue it and fire it as a standard action. Many Shot lets you fire more then one arrow as a standard. I can see that what you say can be true too, but that would seriously downgrade the arcane archer... Almost to the point that it's not worth taking. Anyway, even if you are correct, that build can hold his own over many builds and Incantatrix will never be an arcane trickster. Min/maxing with what you got, is what it's all about. A little antimagic field and the trickster is king. He still have his bow and 9d6 sneak attack :angel: 3. Thats why you're traveling with a party ;)
Darnek Wyrnin 03-03-04, 07:51 PM	What I mean is, he still has a whole bunch of skill points, Asassin Abilities, 9d6 SA, Good Saves, +12 BAB, Good with a bow. Just from this alone, he makes an excellent Rogue. but with the caster level from assassin and Wizard, I would be so bold to say he goes far beyond that.
Stoned Golem 03-03-04, 08:18 PM	I'm not so sure that a +12 BAB counts as good with a bow. There's nothing wrong with the normal use of Imbue Arrow because an area spell will still go off even if you miss the target, but it's no good for sneak attacking with. There's nothing wrong with being an arcane trickster. Being able to deal as much damage to a target with a Ray of Frost as with a Fireball is a wonderful thing, and your roguish skills can come in handy, especially when you augment them with spells. You're just not good at anything but touch attacks. There's nothing wrong with Manyshot. Now that favored enemy damage isn't precision-based anymore, it applies to every arrow, making it very useful for a ranger. However since you'll have an attack bonus of +7 once you figure in the modifiers, you're pretty much forced to either use True Strike before every shot or pray for a natural twenty. Also since only one arrow can deal SA damage it doesn't mesh too well with your strongest abilities. There's nothing wrong with Assassin. The ability to instantly kill or paralyze your opponents is wonderful, and the spell list doesn't hurt either. There's even a spell that lets you make death attacks with ranged weapons. However arcane trickster is still a +1 spellcasting/level class, and adding Assassin drops your already delayed wizard progression by another five levels, meaning that your fireballs won't even do 10d6 until 20th level, and SR will be a lost cause. Basically, there's no problem with any of your base classes, it's just that they don't fit well together. It's a classic case of too many cooks spoiling the broth, for lack of a better metaphor. I would avoid mixing Arcane Trickster with either Assassin or Arcane Archer, but that doesn't rule out combos like Assassin/Arcane Archer. With True Strike on your Assassin spell list, a Manyshot of 4 poison-tipped arrows could cut any foe down to size. In fact, you could even imbue an arrow with the Poison spell to increase the fun. Sneak attack damage, four arrows damage, five saves against poison, and one against death or paralysis isn't too bad at all.
Darnek Wyrnin 03-03-04, 10:26 PM	A build is never more powerful, then the person who use it... And I say it's a powerful build ;) Take it Epic(Arcane trickster), say level 30 and he could take on any class combo one on one, if played right. Remember that with a 20th level build, you have money for a 20th level character, So to hit isn't really much of a problem. With, let's say 22 dex, basic magic items like Gloves of dexterity+6, a +5 tome, +10 bow(+5), Greater bracers of archery, we now have +18 more to hit. Like I said, This charackter isn't missing much say a rogue 20(15 BAB) would or Rogue10/assassin10(14 BAB). I think you're looking to much at basic numbers and not what he can do.
Tytalus 03-04-04, 03:35 AM	Originally posted by Darnek Wyrnin Take it Epic(Arcane trickster), say level 30 and he could take on any class combo one on one, if played right. That's a pretty bold statement for this board, one that usually asks for the label "newbie". Seriously, it's an ok build, but not a miracle. For starters, there's little synergy between assassin and the rest of the classes. You are certainly better off increasing your wizard caster levels.
Nilaus 03-04-04, 06:01 AM	An additional point against your build is that it might be really good at 20th level, but if you have to play that character from level 1 through 20 then it will be ridiculously underpowered during the first 15 or so levels. It is not hard to make an all powerful 20 level character, the trick is to make a character that is above the average power level on every level 1 through 20
Funny Slaughter 03-04-04, 07:05 AM	i dont even agree that its powerful at level 20 a standard trickster sacrifices some casterlevels (2 or 3 normally) to get rogue-skills, sneak attack and some abilities. his main focus is attacking with ray-spells, some builds also feature ranged or even melee. anyhow, the ability to penetrate enemy SR is important for a trickster. a fireball with a casterlevel decreased by 10 wont do much good against any enemy at this level. even SR 14 would grant some chance that this fails... assassin and trickster do not synergize well in my opinion, impromptu sneak attack is the quasi-opposite of death-attack. in my opinion a trickster does ok as a rogue with some magic tricks in the lower levels and swings up to a specialized but nearly full caster later on. if you want to make an effective build using the assassin-PrC i would not use the trickster. if you want to make an effective assassin-build using the trickster stay away from the assassin-PrC, your death-attack is enervation (etc) with loads of sneak-dice followed by some low-level quickened spell with again a full bucket of sneak. gs Funny
rilem 03-04-04, 01:52 PM	Lots of Trickster builds give up power at the expense of flavor (mine certainly does) and I'd say this is another one. I wouldn't say it's ineffective -- you've got a bunch of nifty tricks in your bag and an OK BAB. (Don't rely on those 20th-level items, though; unless you plan on picking off commoners your whole career, your target will have similar AC-boosting items). But the previous posters make excellent points. Your low caster progression will make many of your spells useless against Spell-Resistant creatures. You'll also come up short on dispel checks. Moreover, your build seems to pass up many of the best features of your respective classes. You're a Trickster who doesn't use touch-attack spells (many high-CR opponents have lots of natural armor but low Touch AC). You're an Assassin who doesn't get Hide in Plain Sight (arguably more useful than invisibility at high levels, when every BBEG can see invisible creatures). You're a wizard who doesn't get 6th level spells. By way of example, here's how your assassination mission might be handled by a standard Arcane Trickster (Rog3/Wiz5/AT10) capped with Archmage levels. 1. Scry on target with Greater Arcane Sight, to see what sort of magical protections he has in effect. 2. Cast Greater Invisibility, Ghost Form, etc. Teleport in. 3. Cast a Silent True Strike, followed by a silent, empowered disintegrate, Polar Ray, whatever. Assuming Disintegration, that's 1.5(34d6)+7d6. Or pick something else if you suspect they'd make their FORT save. 3a. Cast choice of: - Quickened, Empowered Scorching Ray (substituting acid, sonic, etc. with Mastery of Elements) if your target is still standing. Another 6d6+7d6 damage. - Quickened, empowered Fireball (again, acidic) if you want to take out the room. - Quickened Gust of Wind to scatter the dust left by your disintegrate spell and hamper resurrections. - Quickened Teleport home. This is just an example, but generally speaking more caster levels is a good thing. If this build is working for you and you dig it, great, but I'm not sure I'd call it very powerful.
rilem 03-04-04, 03:52 PM	bizarre double post