Can Shurikens be powerful in 3.5? - Downloaded from the Wizards Community, all coding removed by Solauren

Can Shurikens be powerful in 3.5?

Post/Author/DateTime Post
#1
smiles.
Jun 30, 2011 12:02:26 Hi!

I'm relativley new to D&D, but I'm playing a monk currently, and we're about to start an epic Campaign, I plan on playing a nymph monk/assassin with the vampire temlate, So I've already found a bunch of "conveniences" when combining these race/template/classes, I'll list them below if anyone is inerested, so looking at my posabilites as a monk, I ended up looking in to shurikens, now obviously the damage is very low, but does anyone have any tips for making them more powerful, so, I'll list my findings related to shurikens before my general finding for this class set up.

Shuriken related:
As a monk with flurry of blows, you can throw up to 7 shurikens per turn, if they are MW and you enchant them with returning, fire blast etc, you can gain a +1 to hit with point blank, +1 for MW, You can throw 1 more shuriken with the Manyshot, on top of all this, you get sneak attack as an assasin, Add poisons to this and you can put out like 6D6 + D2 + Str Mod damage per shuriken. Unless I'm mising something.

General findings:
Vampires suck blood to regain HP and turn other creatures in to vampires with a grapple check, Monks get improved grapple as a bonus feat and normally stack dexerity, on top of this, you'll mostly have your hands free anyway, with your ridiculous amount of movement as a monk, its easy to get to any particular oponents you want to grapple within a crowd.

As a vampire, you can summon rats, bats, wolves etc to aid you in combat, as a monk, you have tongue of the sun and the moon, which allows you to communicate with them to give precise orders.

As an assasin and as a monk you get a type of slowfall incase your flying as a bat and are forced out of it in mid air.

As a vampire is both Undead and Evil, it could be hard to get along with Good Aligned characters, But, Assasins can hide allignment and create trace of life, create one for yourself to magic uses see and believe you are living.

Just another general tip, homebrew tonfas, if your DM will both include them and put them in to the monks weapons catagory(Makes sense), you wil not lose your monk defenses for wearing armour, and you'll get an AC bonus for the tonfa as a weapon, furthermore 2 weapon defense will make this a massive advantage, also it's not a big deal that you are using weapons instead of fists, as kicks count as unarmed attacks.

Thanks for any tips you have and I hope I've possibly helped.
#2
ubbersheep
Jun 30, 2011 14:11:58 That sounds...interesting...maybe I might steal something like that for a villain....
by the way, what edition are you doing?
All of this only pertains if you're doing 3rd or 3.5 (I'm assuming this is 3.5, since you're using a prestige class, so, you're in the wrong forum, but whatever):

For the shurikens, they're a ranged weapon, and to be honest, unless you're specilizing in ranged weaponry, it doesn't need to be as powerful as your normal attack.
As a vampire/monk, you'll want to get in close to grapple and use the many advantages that both vamps. and monks have in melee. I think having a few magical shurikens is cool, but don't spend much time on it.
That's going to be a lot of money for a few shurikens (I understand they're returning, and I've never played with epic characters, so maybe it's a good idea, I don't know, but it seems a bit much).
As such, my first advice is learn what else will be in your group, if you've got a ranger that focuses on ranged weapons, or if you have an arcane spellcaster (or two), then you'll probably be pretty well off when it comes to people doing ranged combat. You might want to focus on the more melee aspects of the vamp/assassin/monk: like sneak atk then grapple.

Anyways, to help you:
-Warlocks can put their eldritch blast onto weapons, it might only be melee weapons, but if it is any weapons, then you could pass it onto the shurikens.

-just make them magical. that's pretty much all you need to think about, really. If they're buffed up by your magic or by the type of magical weapon you put on them, then they'll be better, you could just buy some +5 shurikens. they get +5 to the attack role and to the damage roll. that's definitely a good weapon right there.
#3
jormundgandr
Jun 30, 2011 15:56:49 I find the best thing to use shuriken for in 3.5 is applying Sneak Attack damage. Instead of looking at it as you only getting to apply Sneak Attack damage once per cluster of 3 thrown, think of it as getting 2 extra chances to apply that damage per attack. Keep in mind that you can use both Rapid Shot and Two-Weapon(/Multi-Weapon) Fighting feat trees while wielding thrown weapons. Instead of a Nymph monk, try rolling up a Thri-Kreen rogue and slowly build up your collection of +1 Returning shuriken using every ounce of GP you come across. You will also have the dubious honour of slowing down every combat as you make around thirty attack per round.
#4
smiles.
Jun 30, 2011 16:42:17 Well initially, I want to use shurikens because i personally think they're awesome, so, the idea is reach, itsthe only ranged monk weapon that I can use with flurry of blows, allowing me to sneak attack 7-8 enemies at once my current build would be Nymph(ECL: 8), 12 levels of monk(20), Apply Vamp template(27), 8 levels of Monk (35), 10 leels of assasin(45) coming to a total of 820000 EXP, which is our allowance, things I forgot to add before, taking nymph means that I can blind my enemies giving me oportunity for snea attacks after they've already seen me, the shurikens with encants and poisons and sneak attacks give me 9D6 + D2 + Str as damage per shuriken (or possibly 17D6 + 3D2 + (Str x 3), if sneak attack requires 3 throw attacks according to jormundgandr) and the range of a shuriken, which allows me to maximise my kills, because I plan on being close, but shurikens allow me to target more enemies, If I can get +2 more attacks than normal, I can get 9 per turn, which allows me 3 sneak attacks within 10 ft. and on average 17D6 + 3D2 + (Str x 3) is an instant kill due to massive damage.

My character will have plenty of cash from the outset as we're starting with 820000EXP and as a monk, money is no object I need nothing more than my fists.

@Jormundgandr: By Rapid shot, do you mean Manyshot, and How exactly would TWF benefit me, considering shurikens count as amunition? (I'm currently on holiday and don't have acess to my rule books.)

Another thought, With quick draw, I could do this with bolas instead, giving me trip attacks and D4 instead of D2 damage :P

I am playing 3.5 as per the title, I just didn't see anywhere more apropriate for this thread, apologies.

#5
jormundgandr
Jul 01, 2011 2:13:27
@Jormundgandr: By Rapid shot, do you mean Manyshot, and How exactly would TWF benefit me, considering shurikens count as amunition? (I'm currently on holiday and don't have acess to my rule books.)

SRD counts shuriken as thrown weapons: www.dandwiki.com/wiki/SRD:Thrown_Weapon . The extra attack from ITWF (and all of the feats in this tree) only specifies that it is an off-hand attack, not that it is a melee off-hand attack, which implies that weapons thrown with your off-hand can benefit from the feat and its improved versions so long as you can draw the weapons as a free action (with Quick Draw most likely). Many Shot specifies that it only works with arrows so that's useless to the build, but Rapid Shot (which Many Shot is a prerequisite of) lets you make an extra ranged attack at your highest Base Attack value at the cost of a -2 penalty on all your attack rolls.

www.dandwiki.com/wiki/SRD:Rapid_Shot
www.dandwiki.com/wiki/SRD:Two-Weapon_Fig...
www.dandwiki.com/wiki/SRD:Improved_Two-W...
www.dandwiki.com/wiki/SRD:Greater_Two-We...
www.dandwiki.com/wiki/SRD:Two-Weapon_Fig...
#6
smiles.
Jul 01, 2011 2:38:00 I don't think that it's worth taking two weapon fighting for this to be fair, the minus just makes it seem a waste of a feat when I'll already be making 7 attacks, I also noticed that Rapid shot needs Point blank shot as a rerequisite, not Many shot, which is very good feat tbf, so I think I'll just end up enchanting shurikens and using them without specialising, as I said above, I think I'll do the same for Bolas, they will do more damage and I have the posability to trip 7 people up at once xD

Thanks for the help so far guys! It's much apreciated, Anyone else got any tips?

Post/Author/DateTime	Post
#1 smiles. Jun 30, 2011 12:02:26	Hi! I'm relativley new to D&D, but I'm playing a monk currently, and we're about to start an epic Campaign, I plan on playing a nymph monk/assassin with the vampire temlate, So I've already found a bunch of "conveniences" when combining these race/template/classes, I'll list them below if anyone is inerested, so looking at my posabilites as a monk, I ended up looking in to shurikens, now obviously the damage is very low, but does anyone have any tips for making them more powerful, so, I'll list my findings related to shurikens before my general finding for this class set up. Shuriken related: As a monk with flurry of blows, you can throw up to 7 shurikens per turn, if they are MW and you enchant them with returning, fire blast etc, you can gain a +1 to hit with point blank, +1 for MW, You can throw 1 more shuriken with the Manyshot, on top of all this, you get sneak attack as an assasin, Add poisons to this and you can put out like 6D6 + D2 + Str Mod damage per shuriken. Unless I'm mising something. General findings: Vampires suck blood to regain HP and turn other creatures in to vampires with a grapple check, Monks get improved grapple as a bonus feat and normally stack dexerity, on top of this, you'll mostly have your hands free anyway, with your ridiculous amount of movement as a monk, its easy to get to any particular oponents you want to grapple within a crowd. As a vampire, you can summon rats, bats, wolves etc to aid you in combat, as a monk, you have tongue of the sun and the moon, which allows you to communicate with them to give precise orders. As an assasin and as a monk you get a type of slowfall incase your flying as a bat and are forced out of it in mid air. As a vampire is both Undead and Evil, it could be hard to get along with Good Aligned characters, But, Assasins can hide allignment and create trace of life, create one for yourself to magic uses see and believe you are living. Just another general tip, homebrew tonfas, if your DM will both include them and put them in to the monks weapons catagory(Makes sense), you wil not lose your monk defenses for wearing armour, and you'll get an AC bonus for the tonfa as a weapon, furthermore 2 weapon defense will make this a massive advantage, also it's not a big deal that you are using weapons instead of fists, as kicks count as unarmed attacks. Thanks for any tips you have and I hope I've possibly helped.
#2 ubbersheep Jun 30, 2011 14:11:58	That sounds...interesting...maybe I might steal something like that for a villain.... by the way, what edition are you doing? All of this only pertains if you're doing 3rd or 3.5 (I'm assuming this is 3.5, since you're using a prestige class, so, you're in the wrong forum, but whatever): For the shurikens, they're a ranged weapon, and to be honest, unless you're specilizing in ranged weaponry, it doesn't need to be as powerful as your normal attack. As a vampire/monk, you'll want to get in close to grapple and use the many advantages that both vamps. and monks have in melee. I think having a few magical shurikens is cool, but don't spend much time on it. That's going to be a lot of money for a few shurikens (I understand they're returning, and I've never played with epic characters, so maybe it's a good idea, I don't know, but it seems a bit much). As such, my first advice is learn what else will be in your group, if you've got a ranger that focuses on ranged weapons, or if you have an arcane spellcaster (or two), then you'll probably be pretty well off when it comes to people doing ranged combat. You might want to focus on the more melee aspects of the vamp/assassin/monk: like sneak atk then grapple. Anyways, to help you: -Warlocks can put their eldritch blast onto weapons, it might only be melee weapons, but if it is any weapons, then you could pass it onto the shurikens. -just make them magical. that's pretty much all you need to think about, really. If they're buffed up by your magic or by the type of magical weapon you put on them, then they'll be better, you could just buy some +5 shurikens. they get +5 to the attack role and to the damage roll. that's definitely a good weapon right there.
#3 jormundgandr Jun 30, 2011 15:56:49	I find the best thing to use shuriken for in 3.5 is applying Sneak Attack damage. Instead of looking at it as you only getting to apply Sneak Attack damage once per cluster of 3 thrown, think of it as getting 2 extra chances to apply that damage per attack. Keep in mind that you can use both Rapid Shot and Two-Weapon(/Multi-Weapon) Fighting feat trees while wielding thrown weapons. Instead of a Nymph monk, try rolling up a Thri-Kreen rogue and slowly build up your collection of +1 Returning shuriken using every ounce of GP you come across. You will also have the dubious honour of slowing down every combat as you make around thirty attack per round.
#4 smiles. Jun 30, 2011 16:42:17	Well initially, I want to use shurikens because i personally think they're awesome, so, the idea is reach, itsthe only ranged monk weapon that I can use with flurry of blows, allowing me to sneak attack 7-8 enemies at once my current build would be Nymph(ECL: 8), 12 levels of monk(20), Apply Vamp template(27), 8 levels of Monk (35), 10 leels of assasin(45) coming to a total of 820000 EXP, which is our allowance, things I forgot to add before, taking nymph means that I can blind my enemies giving me oportunity for snea attacks after they've already seen me, the shurikens with encants and poisons and sneak attacks give me 9D6 + D2 + Str as damage per shuriken (or possibly 17D6 + 3D2 + (Str x 3), if sneak attack requires 3 throw attacks according to jormundgandr) and the range of a shuriken, which allows me to maximise my kills, because I plan on being close, but shurikens allow me to target more enemies, If I can get +2 more attacks than normal, I can get 9 per turn, which allows me 3 sneak attacks within 10 ft. and on average 17D6 + 3D2 + (Str x 3) is an instant kill due to massive damage. My character will have plenty of cash from the outset as we're starting with 820000EXP and as a monk, money is no object I need nothing more than my fists. @Jormundgandr: By Rapid shot, do you mean Manyshot, and How exactly would TWF benefit me, considering shurikens count as amunition? (I'm currently on holiday and don't have acess to my rule books.) Another thought, With quick draw, I could do this with bolas instead, giving me trip attacks and D4 instead of D2 damage :P I am playing 3.5 as per the title, I just didn't see anywhere more apropriate for this thread, apologies.
#5 jormundgandr Jul 01, 2011 2:13:27	@Jormundgandr: By Rapid shot, do you mean Manyshot, and How exactly would TWF benefit me, considering shurikens count as amunition? (I'm currently on holiday and don't have acess to my rule books.) SRD counts shuriken as thrown weapons: www.dandwiki.com/wiki/SRD:Thrown_Weapon . The extra attack from ITWF (and all of the feats in this tree) only specifies that it is an off-hand attack, not that it is a melee off-hand attack, which implies that weapons thrown with your off-hand can benefit from the feat and its improved versions so long as you can draw the weapons as a free action (with Quick Draw most likely). Many Shot specifies that it only works with arrows so that's useless to the build, but Rapid Shot (which Many Shot is a prerequisite of) lets you make an extra ranged attack at your highest Base Attack value at the cost of a -2 penalty on all your attack rolls. www.dandwiki.com/wiki/SRD:Rapid_Shot www.dandwiki.com/wiki/SRD:Two-Weapon_Fig... www.dandwiki.com/wiki/SRD:Improved_Two-W... www.dandwiki.com/wiki/SRD:Greater_Two-We... www.dandwiki.com/wiki/SRD:Two-Weapon_Fig...
#6 smiles. Jul 01, 2011 2:38:00	I don't think that it's worth taking two weapon fighting for this to be fair, the minus just makes it seem a waste of a feat when I'll already be making 7 attacks, I also noticed that Rapid shot needs Point blank shot as a rerequisite, not Many shot, which is very good feat tbf, so I think I'll just end up enchanting shurikens and using them without specialising, as I said above, I think I'll do the same for Bolas, they will do more damage and I have the posability to trip 7 people up at once xD Thanks for the help so far guys! It's much apreciated, Anyone else got any tips?