Avalanche of Blades, Untapped Potential? [Archive] - Wizards Community

Avalanche of Blades, Untapped Potential? [Archive] - Wizards Community

Post/Author/DateTime Post
X-Codes
10-02-06, 07:59 PM I've been staring at Avalanche of Blades for a little bit, thinking that there HAS to be some way to get an obscene number of attacks out of it. I was thinking of using Crushing Strike but that doesn't work because it only works on full attacks.

So, anyone else have ideas? Stormguard Warrior is obviously a must...

Maybe use this with Stormguard Warrior? Make an obscene number of touch attacks and then rip it up with Time Stands Still with +40 damage per attack?
Esponer
10-02-06, 08:09 PM Here I was thinking you had finally found a gem for Avalanche of Blades in the third party book "Untapped Potential".

When I have some time I'll be doing some scouring for cumulative attack bonuses for each hit you make. They rapidly increase your luck with the ability: manage a cumulative +2 per hit, and you have twice as many attacks; a cumulative +3, and four times as many; a cumulative +4, a house rule removing "natural 1s miss" (like in the games I play) and hitting on a 1 already, infinite attacks.
GaffeR
10-02-06, 08:11 PM Maybe use this with Stormguard Warrior? Make an obscene number of touch attacks and then rip it up with Time Stands Still with +40 damage per attack?
That's my favorite use of the maneuver thus far.

Round 1: Use Avalance of blades with Combat Rythm, attack until you miss (should be easy to get at least 10 hits by 20th lvl).
Round 2: Use Raging Mongoose, full attack with Time Stand Still, TWF and 2 speed weapons. Deal a couple thousand damage. (26 attacks if Raging Mongoose applies to both full attacks).

Edit: I believe CustServ ruled that secondary effects (like Wounding) apply on that first round of Combat Rythm + Avalance. Just makes this all the more potent. Also, any criticals scored with this maneuver apply to Blood in the Water (CustServ again).
X-Codes
10-03-06, 03:50 AM That's my favorite use of the maneuver thus far.

Round 1: Use Avalance of blades with Combat Rythm, attack until you miss (should be easy to get at least 10 hits by 20th lvl).
Round 2: Use Raging Mongoose, full attack with Time Stand Still, TWF and 2 speed weapons. Deal a couple thousand damage. (26 attacks if Raging Mongoose applies to both full attacks).

Edit: I believe CustServ ruled that secondary effects (like Wounding) apply on that first round of Combat Rythm + Avalance. Just makes this all the more potent. Also, any criticals scored with this maneuver apply to Blood in the Water (CustServ again).
Yes, I asked CustServ and they said that any effect that results when you hit your target does all effects as though it were a successful attack, so one could do this with a greatclub and three mountains style and nauseate your enemy or some such nonsense, or use the Martial Spirit stance and heal a bunch of HP.
Skeeve
10-03-06, 09:45 AM A Jade Phoenix Mage with Arcane Strike and Wraithstrike will eke out a nice, high, double digit number of attacks with this maneuver. Sure, you have to take a feat to pick it up, but it's well worth it IMO.
GDarius
10-03-06, 10:28 AM I just had a thought.

Avalanche of Blades + Stormguard Warrior is damn good, and lets you ramp up damage like crazy based on the number of attacks you can connect.

How/would that interact with something like this (http://boards1.wizards.com/showthread.php?t=409126)?

If it actually worked (and one could put together a Wu-Jen/Warblade/Jade Phoenix Mage/MotUH build that got level 7 spells, and retained a spell secret or two), damage could easily get into the low thousands/high hundreds, and you could apply it to a good 20 targets each round.

Then laugh about it with your full round action.

I'd say that's a pretty good use of the maneuver.
GDarius
10-03-06, 11:50 AM Here's a stab at it. I'm sure more could be done, better.

Race: Human
Build Stub: Wizard 5/ Warblade 1/ Master of the Unseen Hand 4/ Jade Phoenix Mage 10
in the order of Wizard 4/ Warblade 1/ JPM 5/ Wizard 1/ MotUH 2/ JPM 5/ MotUH 2

Relevant Feats:
Practiced Spellcaster, Enlarge Spell (H), Ironheart Aura, Arcane Strike, Arcane Thesis: Telekinesis, Chain Spell(W), Stormguard Warrior, Extraordinary Concentration, Martial Study: Avalanche of Blades

Assuming this works, the combat routine would go

Round 1:

Cast Chain Telekinesis to animate 23 objects.

Round 2:

Use a Swift action to perform 23 full attacks using Stormguard Warrior (115 attacks total. Assuming only 58 of them hit, that's 290 bonus damage per attack next round).
Use your full round action to perform Avalanche of Blades + Stormguard Warrior (throwing in Arcane Strike as needed). Your BAB is 17, so a good 7-8 more attacks should connect (an additional 35 bonus damage).

Round 3:

Use Free action to burn a 6th level spell slot to Arcane Strike.
Use Swift action to perform 23 actual full attacks.*
Use full round action to perform manual full attack** or use Avalanche of Blades again, but this time without Stormguard Warrior

*Assuming an INT of 24 and all mundane weapons, the attack routine here would be 23 x (+30/+25/+20/+15/+10), damage: [weapon damage] + 325 + 7
** Assuming a STR of 20 and a mundane weapon, the attack routine here would be +28/+23/+18/+13, damage: [weapon damage] + 325 + 5 + 6d4.

Assuming only 60 of 119 (1/2, rounded up) attacks hit, that's a damage output of 19 916 + 12d4 + weapon damage across 24 targets.

EDIT: I'm an idiot, arcane strike works on ONE weapon. It's still a high amount of damage, but it could have been truly ridiulous.
Pinky's brain
10-03-06, 12:02 PM Yes, I asked CustServ and they said that any effect that results when you hit your target does all effects as though it were a successful attack
Since wounding does damage any effect which depends on damage is then also automatically triggered ...

If you have an artificer around then a Life Drinker with wounding would be a rather good weapon for this trick ... of course pretty soon you would be facing nothing but constructs and undead, if your DM didn't kill you outright.

This is a reasonable reading of the rules, even if the outcome is not so reasonable. IMO whether chained spells which are steered using concentration can be steered all at once is not a foregone conclusion though (but that's been done to death of course).
GDarius
10-03-06, 02:14 PM IMO whether chained spells which are steered using concentration can be steered all at once is not a foregone conclusion though (but that's been done to death of course).

This is true.

From a rules perspective, I really think it works; a Chained spell is still only one spell, and should be just as maintainable as a single spell, despite it having potentially 20 extra targets.

From a flavor standpoint, it can be a hard sell that you can extend that logic to fighting 23 people. At the very least, a reasonable DM would hand you a -4 or so penalty on your attacks for having to concentrate on so many combats at once.

If you assume a "no" on 23 full attacks/round, the above build still effectively gets an improved version of Perfect Two-Weapon Fighting pre-epic. That's not bad, but not really brilliant either.
OGS-Remix
10-03-06, 02:45 PM If you can use Light Maces, the Lightning Mace Style could give you quite a few extra attacks.

I'm not sure how the wording would interact with Avalanche of Blades, but it helps you get extra attacks throughout the entire progression. It also requires dual-wielding so it fits with Time Stands Still as well.

I haven't spent too much time looking through ToB, but if you can fit in some other threat range enhancements, you could attack for quite some time.
Pinky's brain
10-03-06, 03:35 PM Extra attacks triggered from lightning mace could help increase the damage from stormguard warrior, but that's it ... they don't help you keep the avalanche going.

You need as many reroll spells/abilities/items as you can really, hitting on a touch attack isn't too difficult ... but natural 1s are your bane.
Pinky's brain
10-03-06, 03:40 PM Artificer to the rescue ... put lucky on arrows and you can reroll once for each attack (at the cost of an extra -4 to hit).
iconoplast
10-03-06, 04:27 PM When I have some time I'll be doing some scouring for cumulative attack bonuses for each hit you make.

Crushing Strike (Req: Weapon Focus, Specialization, Mastery, BAB 14): +1 per previous attack with a bludgeoning weapon.

It's the only one I've found so far.
GaffeR
10-03-06, 05:45 PM Pierce Foe, Flay Foe and (IIRC) Bludgeon Foe from Champions of Ruin add a cumulative 1d6 dmg per successful attack each round. If you had the feats to spare (along with the twf tree) and got a couple of morningstars, that could be a decent source of damage.
NoldorForce
10-03-06, 06:27 PM How does using Stormguard Warrior interact with this line?Any weapon-related feats the master of the unseen hand has (such as Weapon Focus or Power Attack) do not apply when he's telekinetically wielding a weapon.
X-Codes
10-03-06, 06:58 PM Crushing Strike (Req: Weapon Focus, Specialization, Mastery, BAB 14): +1 per previous attack with a bludgeoning weapon.

It's the only one I've found so far.
This doesn't work, sadly. It only works on a full attack and the manuver doesn't say anything about Avalanche of Blades being a full attack. It also doesn't appear to matter if you use one or two weapons with the manuver.

Perhaps there is some way to reduce the AC of your opponent on each attack?
GDarius
10-03-06, 08:49 PM How does using Stormguard Warrior interact with this line?

Any weapon-related feats the master of the unseen hand has (such as Weapon Focus or Power Attack) do not apply when he's telekinetically wielding a weapon.

Hmm. I don't suppose it would interact well. While Stormguard Warrior isn't actually a "weapon-related feat", the examples MotUH lists include Power Attack, which seems to be in the same boat. I must have kind of skimmed over the examples after deciding that SW isn't a weapon-related feat. Sounds like what it should actually say there is "combat-related feat" (which means, among other things, that Improved Trip/Grapple/Disarm is pretty useless for an MotUH).

Good catch.

Perhaps there is some way to reduce the AC of your opponent on each attack?
Since wounding does damage any effect which depends on damage is then also automatically triggered ...
How about a DEX targeting poison? That should lower their touch AC pretty effectively.
iconoplast
10-03-06, 11:25 PM Yeah, but just the first time - effects don't stack with themselves, unless we're talking Dex Damage.

Here are the reroll things I've found:
Gloves of Fortunate Striking - 1 Reroll/day
Mantle of 2nd Chances - 1 reroll/day
Luck Blade - 1 reroll/day
Scale Mail of Luck - 1 reroll/week
Markings of the Warrior (feat, Goliath only) - 3/day
Entropomancer lv 5 - 1 reroll/round
Fatespinner lv 4 - 1 reroll/day
Luck Domain - 1 reroll/day
GDarius
10-03-06, 11:55 PM Yeah, but just the first time - effects don't stack with themselves, unless we're talking Dex Damage.

I'm not aware of a poison that applies a penalty instead of dealing ability damage. Ability damage would in fact stack, so a poison that targets DEX would work.
ChordNohVarr
10-08-06, 12:24 PM Recently, one of our epic guys (Swordsage/Wizard type) used the attack in question after casting WraithStrike--his version has Extend Spell and Persistent Spell applied to it--it was used aon a Colossal Red Dragon--he made 22 attacks b4 failing and did over 480 hp of damage--the problem was that the Red Dragon had an invisible pixie cleric with HEAL so all the damage went POOF.(DMs optimize, too.)

Post/Author/DateTime	Post
X-Codes 10-02-06, 07:59 PM	I've been staring at Avalanche of Blades for a little bit, thinking that there HAS to be some way to get an obscene number of attacks out of it. I was thinking of using Crushing Strike but that doesn't work because it only works on full attacks. So, anyone else have ideas? Stormguard Warrior is obviously a must... Maybe use this with Stormguard Warrior? Make an obscene number of touch attacks and then rip it up with Time Stands Still with +40 damage per attack?
Esponer 10-02-06, 08:09 PM	Here I was thinking you had finally found a gem for Avalanche of Blades in the third party book "Untapped Potential". When I have some time I'll be doing some scouring for cumulative attack bonuses for each hit you make. They rapidly increase your luck with the ability: manage a cumulative +2 per hit, and you have twice as many attacks; a cumulative +3, and four times as many; a cumulative +4, a house rule removing "natural 1s miss" (like in the games I play) and hitting on a 1 already, infinite attacks.
GaffeR 10-02-06, 08:11 PM	Maybe use this with Stormguard Warrior? Make an obscene number of touch attacks and then rip it up with Time Stands Still with +40 damage per attack? That's my favorite use of the maneuver thus far. Round 1: Use Avalance of blades with Combat Rythm, attack until you miss (should be easy to get at least 10 hits by 20th lvl). Round 2: Use Raging Mongoose, full attack with Time Stand Still, TWF and 2 speed weapons. Deal a couple thousand damage. (26 attacks if Raging Mongoose applies to both full attacks). Edit: I believe CustServ ruled that secondary effects (like Wounding) apply on that first round of Combat Rythm + Avalance. Just makes this all the more potent. Also, any criticals scored with this maneuver apply to Blood in the Water (CustServ again).
X-Codes 10-03-06, 03:50 AM	That's my favorite use of the maneuver thus far. Round 1: Use Avalance of blades with Combat Rythm, attack until you miss (should be easy to get at least 10 hits by 20th lvl). Round 2: Use Raging Mongoose, full attack with Time Stand Still, TWF and 2 speed weapons. Deal a couple thousand damage. (26 attacks if Raging Mongoose applies to both full attacks). Edit: I believe CustServ ruled that secondary effects (like Wounding) apply on that first round of Combat Rythm + Avalance. Just makes this all the more potent. Also, any criticals scored with this maneuver apply to Blood in the Water (CustServ again). Yes, I asked CustServ and they said that any effect that results when you hit your target does all effects as though it were a successful attack, so one could do this with a greatclub and three mountains style and nauseate your enemy or some such nonsense, or use the Martial Spirit stance and heal a bunch of HP.
Skeeve 10-03-06, 09:45 AM	A Jade Phoenix Mage with Arcane Strike and Wraithstrike will eke out a nice, high, double digit number of attacks with this maneuver. Sure, you have to take a feat to pick it up, but it's well worth it IMO.
GDarius 10-03-06, 10:28 AM	I just had a thought. Avalanche of Blades + Stormguard Warrior is damn good, and lets you ramp up damage like crazy based on the number of attacks you can connect. How/would that interact with something like this (http://boards1.wizards.com/showthread.php?t=409126)? If it actually worked (and one could put together a Wu-Jen/Warblade/Jade Phoenix Mage/MotUH build that got level 7 spells, and retained a spell secret or two), damage could easily get into the low thousands/high hundreds, and you could apply it to a good 20 targets each round. Then laugh about it with your full round action. I'd say that's a pretty good use of the maneuver.
GDarius 10-03-06, 11:50 AM	Here's a stab at it. I'm sure more could be done, better. Race: Human Build Stub: Wizard 5/ Warblade 1/ Master of the Unseen Hand 4/ Jade Phoenix Mage 10 in the order of Wizard 4/ Warblade 1/ JPM 5/ Wizard 1/ MotUH 2/ JPM 5/ MotUH 2 Relevant Feats: Practiced Spellcaster, Enlarge Spell (H), Ironheart Aura, Arcane Strike, Arcane Thesis: Telekinesis, Chain Spell(W), Stormguard Warrior, Extraordinary Concentration, Martial Study: Avalanche of Blades Assuming this works, the combat routine would go Round 1: Cast Chain Telekinesis to animate 23 objects. Round 2: Use a Swift action to perform 23 full attacks using Stormguard Warrior (115 attacks total. Assuming only 58 of them hit, that's 290 bonus damage per attack next round). Use your full round action to perform Avalanche of Blades + Stormguard Warrior (throwing in Arcane Strike as needed). Your BAB is 17, so a good 7-8 more attacks should connect (an additional 35 bonus damage). Round 3: Use Free action to burn a 6th level spell slot to Arcane Strike. Use Swift action to perform 23 actual full attacks.* Use full round action to perform manual full attack** or use Avalanche of Blades again, but this time without Stormguard Warrior Assuming an INT of 24 and all mundane weapons, the attack routine here would be 23 x (+30/+25/+20/+15/+10), damage: [weapon damage] + 325 + 7 * Assuming a STR of 20 and a mundane weapon, the attack routine here would be +28/+23/+18/+13, damage: [weapon damage] + 325 + 5 + 6d4. Assuming only 60 of 119 (1/2, rounded up) attacks hit, that's a damage output of 19 916 + 12d4 + weapon damage across 24 targets. EDIT: I'm an idiot, arcane strike works on ONE weapon. It's still a high amount of damage, but it could have been truly ridiulous.
Pinky's brain 10-03-06, 12:02 PM	Yes, I asked CustServ and they said that any effect that results when you hit your target does all effects as though it were a successful attack Since wounding does damage any effect which depends on damage is then also automatically triggered ... If you have an artificer around then a Life Drinker with wounding would be a rather good weapon for this trick ... of course pretty soon you would be facing nothing but constructs and undead, if your DM didn't kill you outright. This is a reasonable reading of the rules, even if the outcome is not so reasonable. IMO whether chained spells which are steered using concentration can be steered all at once is not a foregone conclusion though (but that's been done to death of course).
GDarius 10-03-06, 02:14 PM	IMO whether chained spells which are steered using concentration can be steered all at once is not a foregone conclusion though (but that's been done to death of course). This is true. From a rules perspective, I really think it works; a Chained spell is still only one spell, and should be just as maintainable as a single spell, despite it having potentially 20 extra targets. From a flavor standpoint, it can be a hard sell that you can extend that logic to fighting 23 people. At the very least, a reasonable DM would hand you a -4 or so penalty on your attacks for having to concentrate on so many combats at once. If you assume a "no" on 23 full attacks/round, the above build still effectively gets an improved version of Perfect Two-Weapon Fighting pre-epic. That's not bad, but not really brilliant either.
OGS-Remix 10-03-06, 02:45 PM	If you can use Light Maces, the Lightning Mace Style could give you quite a few extra attacks. I'm not sure how the wording would interact with Avalanche of Blades, but it helps you get extra attacks throughout the entire progression. It also requires dual-wielding so it fits with Time Stands Still as well. I haven't spent too much time looking through ToB, but if you can fit in some other threat range enhancements, you could attack for quite some time.
Pinky's brain 10-03-06, 03:35 PM	Extra attacks triggered from lightning mace could help increase the damage from stormguard warrior, but that's it ... they don't help you keep the avalanche going. You need as many reroll spells/abilities/items as you can really, hitting on a touch attack isn't too difficult ... but natural 1s are your bane.
Pinky's brain 10-03-06, 03:40 PM	Artificer to the rescue ... put lucky on arrows and you can reroll once for each attack (at the cost of an extra -4 to hit).
iconoplast 10-03-06, 04:27 PM	When I have some time I'll be doing some scouring for cumulative attack bonuses for each hit you make. Crushing Strike (Req: Weapon Focus, Specialization, Mastery, BAB 14): +1 per previous attack with a bludgeoning weapon. It's the only one I've found so far.
GaffeR 10-03-06, 05:45 PM	Pierce Foe, Flay Foe and (IIRC) Bludgeon Foe from Champions of Ruin add a cumulative 1d6 dmg per successful attack each round. If you had the feats to spare (along with the twf tree) and got a couple of morningstars, that could be a decent source of damage.
NoldorForce 10-03-06, 06:27 PM	How does using Stormguard Warrior interact with this line?Any weapon-related feats the master of the unseen hand has (such as Weapon Focus or Power Attack) do not apply when he's telekinetically wielding a weapon.
X-Codes 10-03-06, 06:58 PM	Crushing Strike (Req: Weapon Focus, Specialization, Mastery, BAB 14): +1 per previous attack with a bludgeoning weapon. It's the only one I've found so far. This doesn't work, sadly. It only works on a full attack and the manuver doesn't say anything about Avalanche of Blades being a full attack. It also doesn't appear to matter if you use one or two weapons with the manuver. Perhaps there is some way to reduce the AC of your opponent on each attack?
GDarius 10-03-06, 08:49 PM	How does using Stormguard Warrior interact with this line? Any weapon-related feats the master of the unseen hand has (such as Weapon Focus or Power Attack) do not apply when he's telekinetically wielding a weapon. Hmm. I don't suppose it would interact well. While Stormguard Warrior isn't actually a "weapon-related feat", the examples MotUH lists include Power Attack, which seems to be in the same boat. I must have kind of skimmed over the examples after deciding that SW isn't a weapon-related feat. Sounds like what it should actually say there is "combat-related feat" (which means, among other things, that Improved Trip/Grapple/Disarm is pretty useless for an MotUH). Good catch. Perhaps there is some way to reduce the AC of your opponent on each attack? Since wounding does damage any effect which depends on damage is then also automatically triggered ... How about a DEX targeting poison? That should lower their touch AC pretty effectively.
iconoplast 10-03-06, 11:25 PM	Yeah, but just the first time - effects don't stack with themselves, unless we're talking Dex Damage. Here are the reroll things I've found: Gloves of Fortunate Striking - 1 Reroll/day Mantle of 2nd Chances - 1 reroll/day Luck Blade - 1 reroll/day Scale Mail of Luck - 1 reroll/week Markings of the Warrior (feat, Goliath only) - 3/day Entropomancer lv 5 - 1 reroll/round Fatespinner lv 4 - 1 reroll/day Luck Domain - 1 reroll/day
GDarius 10-03-06, 11:55 PM	Yeah, but just the first time - effects don't stack with themselves, unless we're talking Dex Damage. I'm not aware of a poison that applies a penalty instead of dealing ability damage. Ability damage would in fact stack, so a poison that targets DEX would work.
ChordNohVarr 10-08-06, 12:24 PM	Recently, one of our epic guys (Swordsage/Wizard type) used the attack in question after casting WraithStrike--his version has Extend Spell and Persistent Spell applied to it--it was used aon a Colossal Red Dragon--he made 22 attacks b4 failing and did over 480 hp of damage--the problem was that the Red Dragon had an invisible pixie cleric with HEAL so all the damage went POOF.(DMs optimize, too.)