Post/Author/DateTime	Post
big bear 02-10-04, 11:33 AM	OK, im back in D&D after a long (read decade long) hiatus. We are playing 3.0 with 1 (possible)house rule that i know of: Skills may be bought if either of yer multi classes can have them. This might not be a house rule, not sure right now. I am currently running a R3/S6/AT/2. My sheet isn't here, but here are the important stats i can remember: stats: Str 12, Dex 18, Con 13, Wis 13 (? +1 mod), Int 16, Cha 18. I rolled exceptionally well. Feats: Two weapon fighting, silver palm, spell focus: evocation and i think one other that I don't use much. Spells: Mostly the Ice line (knife, dagger, burst) with Lightning Bolt. I also have the prereq Invisibility and now Improved. Invisibility. Armor: Generally blended quartz chain +4, but I am currently using bracers of armor +7 that I hope to keep (quest equipment) in concert with a +4 ring of prot and a +2 dex ring Weapons: 2 +2 short swords ripped from the dead hands of evil underdark slavers :) and a +1 light xbow Other wonderous items: Cloak of elvenkind, Mantle of Charisma +2, Spider Climb slippers, Rings: Prot +4 and Feather Fall, Hat of Disguise. AM i doing something wrong and where to go from here? My party has some strong fighter types and our elven mage has a 26 int with items so the opponents are starting to get nasty spell resistances that i can't match (level 8 spell caster and all) At next level i get impromptu sneak attack as an ability. For feats, Im clueless but i was toying with using improved invisibility and getting multiple attacks of opportunity when they move away. Im not sure what feat taht is, but I think that it is a single feat, not a "tree". At this point, should I stick with the AT or change to another prestige? :D edit note: My other feat is Weapon Finesse. That make s a difference :D
Prism 02-10-04, 11:48 AM	I'd stick to AT...you're just about getting to the good bit. I have to be honest though, I think your days of melee combat are numbered at this level so I wouldn't be even considering any more combat feats. Your d4+1 hit points a level pretty much force you to stay out of the way - even when invisible. A full attack round from most CR10+ creatures will probablt take you straight out I would start to focus on ranged combat and spells which don't allow SR - unfortunately that doesn't cover many evoc spells which you have taken SF in and as this is 3.0 quite a few of the spells that don't allow SR in 3.5 aren't much use either e.g melfs acid arrow and acid fog don't allow SR in 3.5 I would think about taking solid fog, grease, monster summoning etc. Maybe take spell penetration to help out a little which almost puts you back on level terms TWF can be used for ranged attacks to so you could throw two daggers or more with quick draw. I also like snillocs snowball (1st) in UE which lets to make ranged touch attacks for a number of rounds. I can't see any reason why this can't be combined with TWF
PhaedrusXY 02-10-04, 01:47 PM	In my opinion you messed up taking any melee based feats for this character at all, except maybe Weapon Finesse, but even that is questionable. You're better off focusing on using ranged touch attacks to get your sneak attacks in, not trying to melee with bad hit points and attack bonuses. You can make your enemies lose their Dex to AC by using Improved Invisibility, Blacklight (if you use FR materials), Blink, etc.
big bear 02-10-04, 02:00 PM	I see your point, but look at this: I have +5 dex bonus, +5 BAB, +2 for the weapon, +2 for flank (which i generally get with a barbarian, cleric and paladin in party). This gives me +14 at level 11. Not the best in the world, but unlike a fighter, I get the invisible sneak attack. With the 2 weapon prof and at next level, an extra attack, Ill have +15, +15, +9, +9 all at 1d6+4+3d6. Is a max 16d6 + 16 without crits not strong? Additionally, I would be likely to try and upgrade to a +4 or +6 dex item and AT gets fair attack bonuses. I was originally thinking of using just daggers for offense, but scoring 2 +2 short swords made a difference, and hence my leaning towards magic supported combat. Conversely speaking, there is little besides spell penetration that would be helpful on the mage side in terms of boosting spell effectiveness.
rilem 02-10-04, 02:51 PM	Originally posted by big bear I see your point, but look at this .... . I think you'd only get three attacks at next level, unless you take Impr. TWF as well, but regardless .... Lots of people (myself included) have initially come to similar conclusions about the TWF possibilities of the AT. I had drawn up a nifty Ninja/Wiz/AT with some Swashbuckling Adventures dagger-fighter class that I was fond of. Most of them later realize the AT's real melee problem isn't its attack roll, but its comparatively low HP and AC when trading full attacks with big monsters. You're going to get creamed, even with invisibility. Yes, spells can mitigate this deficiency; check out Funny Slaughter's frontliner mage thread. But using your magic in such a fashion will torpedo the AT's natural focus on ray, illusion and utility spells. The trickster's best trick is doing lots of damage with easy touch attacks — your focus on melee, attack bonuses aside, misses the point that those bonuses would be even more effective if applied to a ray spell. And you'd be safer, to boot. If you're absolutely sold on going toe-to-toe with the beasties, you should at least chuck those swords in the river and pick up either a couple of spectral daggers (chill touch-like attack) or rely on Decastave (also a touch attack)
nihility 02-10-04, 03:04 PM	Check here (http://boards1.wizards.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=95288&highlight=evaluating+arcane+trickster) for some good information on playing a trickster. Edit: what's wrong with the line break? I can't get it to keep the word together...
Kal Skid 02-10-04, 03:58 PM	Heya, I'm currently playing a melee trickster( Exalted Strongheart Halfling, Rog3/Illu5/AT4/EWM1) and have to disagree with the above posters. Melee Tricksters can't take many hits; the d4 hit die really kills this class's ability to get hit a lot. This doesn't mean you can't tank, however. First off, you need to get your AC to very high levels. At level 13, Kurin Stoutsoul (the melee arcane trickster) has this sort of AC. 10 Base +8 Armor (Greater Luminous Armor, Book of Exalted Deeds) +4 shield (Shield) +9 dex (16 base +2 racial +2 size (reduce person down to tiny) +3 level ups +6 enhancement = 29 dex) +2 size (tiny, thanks to Reduce Person) +2 deflection (ring of protection +2) +3 from the monk's belt (+2 wisdom modifier +1 for level 5 monk) +1 haste = 39 AC. Against opponents in melee range that use sight, 43 AC. Combined with fighting defensivly (with many ranks in tumble) to 46 AC. 46 AC is enough to tank anything that isn't hugely over your level. In the last session Kurin found himself surrounded by 3 Iron Golems. He didn't take a single hit, thanks to his stellar AC. Combine that level of AC with things like Improved Blink (UE) and Mirror Image, and you have yourself a character that is indifferent to the melee attempts of his foes. Then you need to work on your attack bonus. It would be helpful if you were using a Spiked Chain in combination with Power Attack and Weapon Finesse to trade the unneeded to hit bonus into damage, but we'll make do with what you already have. Your current attack bonus is 5 BAB + 5 Dex + 2 Enhancement for a total of +12, -2 for TWF. +10 melee bonus, while ok, really isn't enough for a melee based trickster. Getting your dex higher will help a lot, and to this end I also suggest you have a Reduce Person spell permanently cast on you. This will increase your TWF attack bonus to +12, while reducing your damage slightly. Create Magic Tattoo (Sor/Wiz 2) out of the FRCS is an excellent spell, and you can get a +1 luck bonus to attacks and a +2 competence bonus to attacks out of it, bringing you up to +15. Getting better, but still not quite up to snuff. Getting Boots of Speed or Armor of Speed will increase your attack bonus by another +1, up to a total of +16/+16. If your DM allows you to be cheesy with custom items, you can raise your attack bonus much further. An item that casts Persistent Divine Favor once per day, caster level 15th, provides a +5 luck bonus to hit and damage all day long. This item isn't that pricey at 27,000 gold [(1800 command word * lvl 5 spell * 15th lvl caster)/5], considering the benefit. An item with a constant Ray of Hope effect (Cleric 1, +2 morale bonus to attacks/saves/checks) is a mere 8,000 GP (2000 continous item * lvl 1 spell * lvl 1 caster * 4 (factor for 1 round/level spells to be continous). An item with a constant Shield effect (Sor/Wiz 1) is cheap at 4,000 GP (2000 continous items * lvl 1 spell * lvl 1 caster * 2 (factor for 1 min/level spells to be continous). As far as spells go, make sure you have access to the following. Reduce Person (Sor/Wiz 1) combined with Permanency (Sor/Wiz 5) is a solid +2 to hit and AC (+2 Dex and +1 size bonus). Mirror Image (Sor/Wiz 2) is every mage's best friend, and melee tricksters aren't the exception. Blink (Sor/Wiz3) is amazing, and the downside of 20% miss chance is later overcome by Improved Blink (Sor/Wiz 5, Unapproachable East), which is Blink without the personal miss chance. Lesser Sonic Orb (Sor/Wiz 1, Miniature's Handbook) is an awesome spell. It does 1d6 sonic damage that scales to 5d6 at caster level 9. The best part? It requires a ranged touch attack (which enables sneak attack), has no save, AND no SR. The actual damage isn't amazing, but it is very reliable and sonic resistance is by far the least common. Tensor's Transformation (Sor/Wiz 6) is likewise cool, although it does lock you into being a melee for 1 round per level. Feat wise, your choices so far have been ok. You went two weapon fighting, silver palm, spell focus: evocation and weapon finesse. I would've gone with EWP Spiked Chain, Weapon Finesse, Power Attack (after raising str to 13), and Spellcasting Prodigy. Make sure your next feat is Arcane Strike (Complete Warrior). Btw, you would need to take Improved Two Weapon Fighting for another attack on your off hand. -Kal Skid.
Snow Savant 02-10-04, 05:27 PM	Kal Skids's build, equipment usage, spell/feat selection, & tactics is further confirmation that the Arcane Trickster can be tricked-out in a number of different ways. Although I don't advocate taking the Trickster into melee range, even with a sky-high AC, because that's not the most optimized way to use his class ability set. Tricksters are best firing from range with Rays, Arrows, Illusions, & NoSave/NoSR spells. Melee range also puts you into Grapple range, which is death to the Trickster who doesn't have an amped Escape Artist skill (bolstered by magic items and spells). I might add one other thing. The Trickster is inherently a rather selfish, self-buffing primary spellcaster. It's easy to fall into the trap of using all your spells buffing yourself and for attack spells. Remember to save some spell slots to enhance your party members. Or at least use them for divinations or Summon Monster spells (that can cast buff and heal spells on your party mates). I advocate using your magic item Craft feats (which you need one at least ) to make items for your party-mates for cheap or free, if you still intend to cast primarily on yourself. Summation: Play a "team-oriented" Arcane Trickster .... it's a challenge due to limited spell slots (compared to a straight Mage), but it's not impossible. XO, Snow :cloud9:
Funny Slaughter 02-11-04, 06:07 AM	Kal Skid, you are playing your trickster as a melee-caster. that is a doable concept but quite risky. using reduce person results in an AoO and you dont threaten anymore, so no flanking and no sneak-attack. you are using lots of buff-spells, party some very high-level with a duration of 1 round/lvl. this means you spend the first rounds of combat buffing yourself? you could have done a big pot full of sneak-dice till then. using cheesy self-made items is not the way to go, a caster is self-reliant and your persistant divine favor-mojo wont get past any serious DM. as snow mentioned one of your major weaknesses is to get grappled. a high escape artist allows to escape eventually, but wont stop the damage you get until then. your touch-AC is not really stellar and your grapple-check hindered by a -8 sizemod and a quasi nonexistant strength. relying on invisibility etc is nice, but the level you are playing gets the enemies a few things like blindsight (2nd or 3rd level spell), see invisibility (potion) or true seeing. i think as a DM i would just take the chance of hitting you for a grapple, 50% is not that bad, and even 25% if you have blink up and running does not hinder a successful grapple over time. another weakness is the low casterlevel, getting hit by (greater) dispel is one action from your enemy negating all your rounds of buffing. getting to a point now: - focussing on ray-attacks would leave many feats open, would leave you in secure and would do more damage overall - casting your spells on your partys fighter would result in a higher overall damage-output when you cast battlefield-spells or summons then while sneaking with rays. - reduce person just dont work - etc gs Funny
big bear 02-11-04, 01:06 PM	Ok, I leveled to 12 last night. Hre are my thoughts: As a human, I get the shaft on the whole being tiny high ac thing and as a sorcerer, i want to be blasting or stabbing. My handy mage of making things upped my dex gloves to 6 and my charisma mantle to 4 giving me (with my new stat point bringing dex to 20). This puts me at +7 dex to attack and defense (about a 28 AC) Other choices of note: 2nd level spell - endurance. Not much else I could think of. Even with the wizard packing this spell, aside from bull strength, there arent many more utility spells. There might be a better choice and I am open. 3rd level spell - fly. 7 fly spells a day does not suck. 4th level spell - fire orb. This is a nice flexable spell and it fills a whole in my elements, leaving me just acid and sonic elemental spells to add to my rep. feat - spell penetration:evocation. This gives me an effective -1 level to my overall for spell resistance and that makes my offensive spells nearly as effective as those of my straight mage party companion. As a note, we tok down a slightly buffed CR blue dragon (6 person group, levels 11 and 12) down in 3 rounds thanks to 122 poins each of lightning protection. I am much safer in hand to hand than you would think and Im not afraid of ressurection and the ability to switch to blood mage :)
PhaedrusXY 02-11-04, 01:13 PM	Spell Penetration counts for all of your spells, you don't take it for specific schools. It adds to your caster level checks against Spell Resistance. Spell FOCUS is what you take for specific schools. It adds to the save DC for spells from the schools you take it for. If you really want to melee, then I'd advise getting the spell Magic Jar when you get high enough. Then possess your enemies and use their bodies. That way, if you die it won't matter. You'll just have to come up with some way of carrying/protecting your own body while doing this.
Kal Skid 02-11-04, 01:41 PM	Heya, "Kal Skid, you are playing your trickster as a melee-caster. that is a doable concept but quite risky. using reduce person results in an AoO and you dont threaten anymore, so no flanking and no sneak-attack." Being in a solo campaign, flanking isn't an option. This campaign is very dungeon based, so most encounters are up close and personal, making a 5-foot step to attack someone viable. "you are using lots of buff-spells, party some very high-level with a duration of 1 round/lvl. this means you spend the first rounds of combat buffing yourself? you could have done a big pot full of sneak-dice till then." Certainly true. Keep in mind that there are a huge amount of things in the game that are immune to sneak attacks,and in order to sneak attack, you need to be invisible/blinking or flanking. One of these options is open to Kurin. Catching opponents flat footed also works, but it is heavily situational. In combat, Kurin will only use a single defensive buff (Greater Invis or Improved Blink) before entering melee. "using cheesy self-made items is not the way to go, a caster is self-reliant and your persistant divine favor-mojo wont get past any serious DM." When you have a party of four characters, I would certainly agree. When you have a single character regularily facing encounters 3-4 above his ECL, every little bit helps. "as snow mentioned one of your major weaknesses is to get grappled. a high escape artist allows to escape eventually, but wont stop the damage you get until then. your touch-AC is not really stellar and your grapple-check hindered by a -8 sizemod and a quasi nonexistant strength." Grappling is a pain. Kurin's AC stops a great deal of grapple attempts (improved grab and touch attacks). When he does get grappled, he either escape artists (+34 on the check) or casts dimension door. Keep in mind that for a mere 40,000 GP (Ring of Freedom of Movement), you can become immune to grappling. "relying on invisibility etc is nice, but the level you are playing gets the enemies a few things like blindsight (2nd or 3rd level spell), see invisibility (potion) or true seeing. i think as a DM i would just take the chance of hitting you for a grapple, 50% is not that bad, and even 25% if you have blink up and running does not hinder a successful grapple over time." Also true. Improved Blink stops this somewhat, retaining a 20% miss chance even when they can see invisibility. As for the grapple comment, see my above comment. "another weakness is the low casterlevel, getting hit by (greater) dispel is one action from your enemy negating all your rounds of buffing." This really painful. Kurin has yet to acquire a weapon with Spellblade (Dispel Magic or Greater Dispel Magic), so a targetted dispel is pretty much as bad as it comes. Thankfully, Kurin always has several escape methods, and with no other party members, doesn't have to worry about leaving someone behind. "getting to a point now: - focussing on ray-attacks would leave many feats open, would leave you in secure and would do more damage overall" Except for acid arrow/minor orbs, ray/energy missiles offer spell resistance. As you've pointed out, the melee trickster has a low caster level. If you roll a 1 on your SR check for scorching ray, you're hosed. If you roll a 1 on your attack roll, you can try again next round. "- casting your spells on your partys fighter would result in a higher overall damage-output when you cast battlefield-spells or summons then while sneaking with rays." Perhaps, but there is no party fighter to cast on. "- reduce person just dont work" It only works if you need absurdly high AC. It does, however, leave you open to special attack options, such as Bull Rush, Disarm, Sunder, etc. "- etc gs Funny" As Snow and Funny have pointed out, the melee trickster is not, in fact, the best character in the game in melee. Nor is he the best at casting spells, or even sneak attacking. He does, however, mesh these attack forms together nicely. The melee trickster is vulnerable without his buffs, as are all mages. The melee trickster also requires a lot of effort to get up to snuff; it's a long road to Arcane Trickster, as any can tell you. That being said, I'm still incredibly happy with this character's performance. He continually survives fights several above his ECL without a single point of damage taken, has a massive amount of skills for dungeon crawling, decent sneak attack, and handy arcane spells. -Kal Skid.
big bear 02-25-04, 11:09 AM	OK, now i have a BIG problem. Our recent quest involved my CN trickster taking posession of an artifact that gives me access to each sufffering domain spell as a level 20 carster 1 per day, but drops my cha by 10 and turns me CE while I have it. It is not letting me get rid of it. On the off chance that I have to fight my away from the paladin and cleric of Tyr in my party (as well as the flying dwarf raging freaking berzerker with 300 hp) and just having reached a new level (14), what spells should I pick to get out of the situation. (i get a 2,3,4 5th level spell). As a kicker, they all have dispell invisible items with a 25' radius and the dwarf has a huge save cept reflex AND there is a deepwoods sniper. How do i get out of here? Teleport lets me go to my homeland (read, roll a new character) Blink keeps me from getting waxed maybe. If possible, I'd like to either kill no one or kill them all. I am currently under a mass haste spell so I can fly/run really fast :)
rilem 02-25-04, 11:36 AM	Need more data. What are your current spells? Why do have to roll up a new character if you just teleport away? Are your companions aware of this artifact and its effect on you? Note: If you don't have it, Improved Blink (unapproachable east, 5th level) is great for a melee sneak attacker.
big bear 02-25-04, 12:30 PM	Party - LG Paladin of Tyr (14), LG Cleric/Conemplative of Tyr (13 overall), not evil Sun Elf Wizard (14), Dwarven Frenzied Berzerker (14) who worships Tyr, Human good Deepwood sniper worshiper of Tyr Me - CN Trickster from Impultur who has "loose" ties to the Church of Mask. Spells of note: The majority of Ice spells (knife, dagger, burst), Lightning Bolt, Fire Orb (useless against high F savers), Hold Monster , regular and Improved Invisibility, Fly, endurance, magic missle. Since I have this piece of an artifact (as instructed by Mask to get before the followers of Bane and Teluna [sp?] use it to destroy the plane) which basically gives me control over a piece of Teluna's suffering domain and has made me CE from CN, I am stuck. I get first initiative next round but I instinctively believe that they will kill me outright if they think I am possessed, or more accurately, they have naught but hold person to stop me before I flee. If i flee, they will think I'm evil and possibly track me down. If i stay and fight, I could kill a few (including the resurrector cleric if i am lucky) but I cant drop the dwarf with that stupid no-die frenzy thing and I'll have to run. If I stay and they try to take the artifact, I'll have to defend myself to keep it. This is starting to xover into the character development, but I would like to know what 4 spells give me the best chance of not dying. Improved Blink (wich I do not have access to but could possibly buy this weekend) would likely allow me to kill more people. Since we can't be killed by the DM, i guess he is keeping us in check by splitting the group through a bad series of coincidences.
Funny Slaughter 02-25-04, 12:42 PM	your character became CE so now you have to play an evil character. you dont have to declare war to your party, its fine to take then one by one, use poison, sell them to slavers or to their enemies etc. you are a caster, you can communicate via distance or teleport to people who will help you. contact the church of bane, after all its an artifact that is threatened by all these paladins. make a pact with some fiends or demons. dont put yourself in front of the party and tell them that you became evil and would like to get neutral again... this is more a roleplaying-question since you wont be able to survive in an open fight. gs Funny
rilem 02-25-04, 01:13 PM	What Funny said. This is really more of a "What's a Player to do?" question, but as long as you're here .... You're CE, so act like it. Some thoughts: As a Sorceror AT with an effective CHA of 8, it doesn't matter what your spells are: You can't cast 'em. Too bad, no teleport, no fly, no nothing. If you fight, you die. But what makes you think a fight is inevitable right now? Even with your lower CHA, you hopefully have lots of bluff ranks. Simply suggest that, now that you're holding the artifact, you've discovered how it was crafted and know how it may be destroyed. Then poison everybody. With your current stats and no Sorceror spells, running really becomes your only recourse. If you want to hit and then run, you could use the artifact's domain powers: • If this were 3.5, Harm would be perfect — it does damage and requires to hit, so you get to add your sneak attack on it. Kill the wizard or cleric first. (edit: forgot this was 3.0. sorry.) • Horrid wilting -- you might get one of them.
big bear 02-25-04, 03:48 PM	Thanks, it seems that improved blink is the way to go (is this in the srd?). For the character side, you can help on my post on the char dev board. Trickster in Crisis (http://boards1.wizards.com/showthread.php?s=&postid=2674386#post2674386)