Post/Author/DateTime	Post
Mommy was an Orc 05-28-07, 12:10 PM	I've been playing around with an interesting Dragon Disciple build - wonder what people thought... Wood Elf Str 16, Dex 16, Con 12, Int 12, Wis 12, Cha 8 1: Ranger 1: Quickdraw, Track 2: Beguiler 1 3: Ranger 2: Rapid Shot, Power Attack 4: Ranger 3: Endurance: Str 17 5: Ranger 4 6: Dragon Disciple 1: ? 7: Dragon Disciple 2: Str 19 8: Wildrunner 1: Str 20 9: Wildrunner 2: ? 10: Dragon Disciple 3 11: Dragon Disciple 4: Str 22 Basically, the build is a skill monkey with some tank and archery elements. I'm going to likely take Improved Buckler Defense so I can maintain AC at an APL+20+ range. Maybe Improved Shield Bash. He should do decent damage with Blades of Flame and consistently hit with Guided Shot. If it isn't clear, he's putting the DD bonus spells onto Ranger. The problem happens at 12th level - there are a lot of good options, but for obvious reasons, I can't take all of 'em. 1: Barbarian 1, levels in either Wildrunner, Ranger or Fighter. Extra Rage is nice. 1a: Wildrunner 6 for Pounce/HiPS. 2: Barbarian 1, Beguiler 2, Unseen Seer 1-2 - lose a point of BAB, but gain 2nd level spells and the ability to cast divination spell of my choice. 3: Beastmaster 1+Natural Bond at 12th then take 3 more levels in Beastmaster or Animal Lord. Skills are okay and the Animal Companion ends up being 3 levels behind. Not amazing, but good enough. 4: Something I may have missed? Thoughts? The element of Ranger/Beguiler/Dragon Disciple seems odd to me, but workable - DD for general toughness, Beguiler for trapfinding/tumble/balance, Ranger for all around skills and necessary feats.
_metz_ 05-28-07, 12:22 PM	Its definitely interesting, I think you are better off going the Barbarian route with extra rage at 12 personally. (You get pounce too late for it to really float my boat) The thing is - are you going ranged or not??? I think DD doesn't work that well with an archery build as you are feat starved and don't get full BAB and you may be trying to do too many things with it... I just like fighter/monk DD builds much more. A fully focused wild runner DD archer build could work, but that level of beguiler, and less fighter levels could really hurt considering one level of Barbarian and extra rage will get you the same str boost 3 times a day... This character gets pounce way too late, so it seems like it will be marginal at a couple of things. Ok at dealing out damage (but not fantastic) and a relatively ok shot with a bow, but nothing special. As for skills well, decent skills but I am not sold on it really. The unseen seer levels don't seem very necessary as you ain't trying to do precision damage... It will be a useful character, but won't shine in any one field. The DD seems a little unnecessary imo.
Mommy was an Orc 05-28-07, 12:43 PM	Its definitely interesting, I think you are better off going the Barbarian route with extra rage at 12 personally. (You get pounce too late for it to really float my boat) The thing is - are you going ranged or not??? I think DD doesn't work that well with an archery build as you are feat starved and don't get full BAB and you may be trying to do too many things with it... He's flexible on that. He's a skirmisher who tries to do a little damage before closing. He's a: Round 1: Shoot or Throw(use Guided Shot if necessary), draw Reach Weapon, move to position to block incoming. Round 2: Draw main weapon(use Blades of Flame) The problem with Barbarian is that cuts off his spells and skill points. Despite having 7 skill points for most of the build, the Dragon Disciple really hurts him in the skill point area.
Morgen 05-29-07, 12:24 PM	There certainly are enough nice Ranger spells out there to take if you apply the DD's bonus spells to ranger. So with the right spells if you take some barbarian you can get quite a lot of stat boosts going. Rage, Primal Scream, that's what? 28 strength without any items? Go grapplin'
jstorrie 05-29-07, 01:37 PM	What sort of attack routine can you get going with DD/ranger? Claw/claw/bite/iterative armor spikes/off-hand armor spikes?
Timlagor 05-29-07, 05:31 PM	I'm pretty sure you can't get iteratives at all if you use a natural weapon as your primary attack form. You have to use the manufactured weapon as your primary and the naurals as secondaries.
DuctShuiTengu 06-02-07, 02:54 PM	He's flexible on that. He's a skirmisher who tries to do a little damage before closing. He's a: Round 1: Shoot or Throw(use Guided Shot if necessary), draw Reach Weapon, move to position to block incoming. Round 2: Draw main weapon(use Blades of Flame) The problem with Barbarian is that cuts off his spells and skill points. Despite having 7 skill points for most of the build, the Dragon Disciple really hurts him in the skill point area. You might want to look into Brutal Throw (possibly Power Throw as well) for this character. Let that massive Strength score cover you on ranged attacks as well. Pounce from Wild Runner 6 would be nice, but as was already mentioned, level 15 seems a bit late in the game. I'd probably take a level of two of Barbarian, and consider dipping into Fighter if you need an extra couple of feats (levels of Scout could be used to help make up the lost skill points, and with charging or throwing and moving into position to intercept charges, it shouldn't be too hard to pick up the skirmish bonus reasonably often.) Edited to add: if you plan to go with light thrown weapons, TWF will have the same effect in ranged combat as rapid shot, and can be used in melee (though I'm not sure if you'd ever want to), though it's not usable with bows, and is less useful if you're using one-handed or two-handed thrown weapons. Something to think about, perhaps.