I was thinking of Shadowdancer for the ability to Dimension Door between shadows to activate my Skirmish, what else could I do?
Thanks in Advance
Travel Devotion (CChamp) will let you move you speed at a swift action for 1 minute once/day. Though it's not with TWF, Greater Manyshot will let you get up to 4 attacks off a standard action.
There's a stance in ToB that lets you take 2 5 foot steps.
The Elocater PrC (qhich requires Psionics) lets you take 2 5 foot steps.
Sparring Dummy of the Master (Arms and Equipment Guide) lets someone with a level in Monk take a 10ft step a round.
OK, making a Scout/Ranger (for two weapon fighting and Skirmish) and I was wondering how I could make him better. I don't want the LA for Catwhatever's Racial Pounce ability.
I was thinking of Shadowdancer for the ability to Dimension Door between shadows to activate my Skirmish, what else could I do?
Thanks in Advance
Go Dervish and use the Dervish dance to move while making a full attack, activating your Skirmish in the process.
Go Dervish and use the Dervish dance to move while making a full attack, activating your Skirmish in the process.
By the time he gets the feets and preform ranks most campaigns will be over I'm not denyinh this is useful/nice but its not that nice.
I think that I may look into dervish when I get home to my books. I am not sure of the what I would need to get it. but my DM wants everything to be "reasonable" so dipping into a completely different PC for just one level is not really viable, and for the campaign we are playing he won't allow Catfolk (Frostburn style campaign.)
Thanks again for the ideas, and keep them coming, please!
By the time he gets the feets and preform ranks most campaigns will be over I'm not denyinh this is useful/nice but its not that nice.
You only need 3 ranks in perform, even buying it cross class you can easily meet that by level 3.
The feats, with a human Scout/Ranger, can be met by level 6 (along with grabbing Swift Hunter) letting you move into Dervish at level 7, which is right around where you can enter most prestige classes. Also, most Scouts will be going for the Dodge, Mobility, Spring Attack chain anyway, so the feat requirements aren't that brutal).
Thanks for all the help guys, Some more info that might help. I am starting at 6th level to join the rest of the party. I did the google search for scout on these forums and didn't find anything, but after the posts here I have found the Scout's handbook and all.
I think that I may look into dervish when I get home to my books. I am not sure of the what I would need to get it. but my DM wants everything to be "reasonable" so dipping into a completely different PC for just one level is not really viable, and for the campaign we are playing he won't allow Catfolk (Frostburn style campaign.)
Thanks again for the ideas, and keep them coming, please!
There's a Dervish Handbook thread you can look at. It's a good melee class, no need to limit it to a 1 level dip. You could mix Dervish and Ranger levels the rest of the way. To get in you'd need to look at something like this:
Scout 1 - Dodge (or take Expeditious Dodge from Races of the Wild instead, probably a better choice for a Dervish), Mobility
Scout 2 -
Scout 3 - Weapon Focus
Scout 4 - Combat Expertise (Scout Bonus feat)
Ranger 1-
Ranger 2 - Swift Hunter
I'm playing this at the moment. Just remove the template and tweak the feats. I consider it the best swift hunter ever. You also need extra favored class due to multiclassing penalties (my campaign doesn't have any).
Scout 4/Cleric 1/Ranger 15
I use two weapon fighting along with throwing weapons (force javelins from my gloves) so that i can function at both range and melee (if i have to).
One last note: Telling people not to dip is not good. Multiclassing rules are core (just after the wizard class) and most importantly, your character doesn't know what kind of class he is exactly. Otherwise, that's metagaming.
//edit: oh, and forget about dervish. It's trash. It doesn't progress your skirmish (which is your damage output) or favored enemies (favored enemies are extra important to apply your skirmish damage to monsters normally immune to it) nor gives you spells. Travel devotion completely trumps the prestige.
Its a nice toy and works fairly well with snowflake wardance from frostburn.
http://www.campaign-blog.com/view.php?id=8096
I'm playing this at the moment. Just remove the template and tweak the feats. I consider it the best swift hunter ever. You also need extra favored class due to multiclassing penalties (my campaign doesn't have any).
Scout 4/Cleric 1/Ranger 15
I use two weapon fighting along with throwing weapons (force javelins from my gloves) so that i can function at both range and melee (if i have to).
One last note: Telling people not to dip is not good. Multiclassing rules are core (just after the wizard class) and most importantly, your character doesn't know what kind of class he is exactly. Otherwise, that's metagaming.
//edit: oh, and forget about dervish. It's trash. It doesn't progress your skirmish (which is your damage output) or favored enemies (favored enemies are extra important to apply your skirmish damage to monsters normally immune to it) nor gives you spells. Travel devotion completely trumps the prestige.
Travel Devotion+Knowledge Devotion is indeed powerful for any Swift Hunter.
Really, if I am reading it correctly, then I don't have to take a level of cleric to pick up the Travel Domain due to my Ranger levels. Or am I missing something?
You can spend a feat to pick up Travel Devotion. Clerics have the option to swap out the domain for the feat, and can spend turning attempts to use it multiple times/day.
Some background on my character:
3Rgr/4Sct/2Ftr/4Derv (Level 13)
True Neutral Half Elf (Augmented Humanoid: Chosen of Silvanus)
I am also a TWF Ranger with Skirmish, and I gave up some Ranger/Scout because of my race (wanted to progress into Dervish on Level 9, 2 levels later than a normal Human entry). I ENJOY my Dervish a lot, pardon me.
Feats I took:
Expeditious Dodge (in place of Dodge)
Mobility
Combat Expertise
Weapon Focus (Scimitar, I don't care if I feel like Drizzt)
Deadly Defense
Swift Hunter
Improved Skirmish
Improved Critical
I'm currently the defacto melee in the party, and I deal 7d6 of damage per slash (with Rogue's Vest). Dervish gave me a few things I found myself needing as a TWFer - More to hit. By level 3Derv I have covered the penalties with TWF when dancing. On top of it, I have pretty nice AC (34 AC = 10 Base + 8 Armor + 2 Dodge + 4 Skirmish + 1 Sacred + 5 Dex + 2 ComEx + 1 Derv) unbuffed. My previous fight with my party Warweaver got me to 53 (+16 NatArmor + 1 Haste + 2 Vs Evil) after polymorphing into Cave Troll + Spiderskin.
With bane weapons and a 15-20 crit range, I am pretty much the main damage dealer in the party, and the best part is that I do function pretty well in a DMZ/AMF as my DM has found out when I was level 11. IMO Dervish is a very excellent class for a Swift Hunter build, and I don't even have any devotion feats for the matter.
For my level 15th feat, I'm looking at Animal Devotion for the boost in speed and strength. TWF ranger weaknesses are DR (hopefully skirmish covers that pain a bit) and to Hit (which the dervish bonuses covers the pain). Other problems like Trip can be covered with the Tumble skill trick (which you would have insane amount of Tumble anyway) and the Boots of Agile Leaping which you need to invest 5pts in Balance to use.
As such, I don't feel that Dervish is not worth a look for a Swift Hunter build, since let's just say, I can single handedly down 2 sea trolls in one round without prebuffing. Against medium sized creatures, yes to massive damage fort save every hit (and that's 6)!
//edit: oh, and forget about dervish. It's trash. It doesn't progress your skirmish (which is your damage output) or favored enemies (favored enemies are extra important to apply your skirmish damage to monsters normally immune to it) nor gives you spells. Travel devotion completely trumps the prestige.
IMHO, I disagree to this statement. Firstly, for a lvl 20 human build that goes for a effective lvl 10 scout for skirmish and takes 10 lvls of dervish only loses 2d6 damage from skirmish. Thats not a lot of damage to lose for the goodies you get from the Dervish PrC. Let's see what you get instead:
Ability to move AND full attack when dancing (no extra actions needed)
Good Reflex AND Will
Free AC (+3 at lvl 10)
Free +hit and +dam when dancing (+5/+5 at lvl 10)
Free feats (Spring Atk, Cleave and Great Cleave (when dancing))
Able to take 10 on tumble checks
Speed bump (+5 more later on)
Improving your initiative (+2)
Elaborate Parry (Awesome. +7 AC when fighting defensively)
A Thousand Cuts (Double your attacks. Enough said)
Dervish is a good balance of offense and defense. Only setback is that you have to have the speed to cover the distance which is easily fixed by Boots of Speed to give you the extra boost in the first round.
Honestly, in all campaigns, i rarely see immune skirmish mobs such as elementals, plant or oozes. Even if you do encounter them , it would be easier for another party member to dispose of them (let them have some fun too).
Here is my take on the coveted Travel Devotion. For a skirmish user, it is A TRAP (or at most a backup). Why? You basically use up your swift actions every round to maintain your Skirmish. In this day in age where swift actions mean everything (some times between life and death), it is imperative that swift actions are kept wide open. Even for immediate actions, it means that your next round would be devoid of skirmish. What will you miss when you use up your swift actions? Plenty.
Gloves of Agile Striking (boosts skirmish +2d6 for 1 round)
Belt of Battle (Full Atk AGAIN? Insane with A Thousand Cuts)
Skill Tricks (Most use swift or immediate actions, like getting up from prone and the like)
All swift spells (which is quite a number of them in the ranger spell list)
Just some i can think off the back of my head. But it totally gimps your ability to get out of tight pinches. This is where Dervish shines, as long as you can dance, you need no action whatsoever to continue applying your dervish. Once you get 3/day dances, you can dance in almost all encounters. Well, you can even get Dervish AND Travel Devotion, so that you can use the devotion ability as backup if there are anymore encounters.
And do not be afraid to go into melee. There is not much difference between melee and 30ft ranged (Unless its a leap attacker in which case you SHOULD go melee. In fact that said Leap Attacker would make better use of Travel Devotion ironically). A large/huge sized creature do not have to move much to be able to hit you 30ft away. So AC is important. Get Armor Spikes and put the Defending enchancement on them. Then, invest in a Rod of Lesser Chaining and give it to the party wizard. Tell him this is a gift to ask him to prepare Greater Magic Weapon once per day and chain it to your weapons and spikes, and in return you don't care what he does with the other 2 charges. If you are really nuts on AC get defending on both your weapons too (not sure if they stack).
And btw, you do not have to go into 1 Cleric to get your Turn Undead to power it. A level in Death Delver (Heroes of Horror) will do and it is quite flavorful for rangers who have Favored Enemy (Undead). It gives you Rebuke Undead at first level which you can use to power up your Devotion feats. No multiclassing penalties there.
BTW, i would recommed that you focus on STR and not DEX when TWFing (basically don't take Weapon Finesse for example). Just have enough Dex to meet the requirements for TWFing (unless you have 6 lvls in ranger). STR boosts your +hit and +dam and it gets wild when you get polymorphed which you might get a lot once the party wizard likes his Rod of Lesser Chaining more and more.
Hopefully, you get some ideas from reading this super long post!
- Dervish requires weapon focus and combat expertise. These two are pretty much worthless to the swift hunter.
- Assuming that you enter the class at 6+ level (3 scout, 1 ranger, 2 more for BAB), you will be able to dervish dance for each battle at level 11+. That's not early.
- The fast movement is an enhancement bonus, which doesn't stack with the scout's fast movement.
- The dervish dance lasts for a number of rounds equal to half your ranks in perform, which is a cross class skill for both your entry classes.
- Dervish doesn't progress ranger spells.
- Dervish only gives 4+int skill ranks. Remember that swift hunters are not just damage dealers. They are all around characters. This makes able learner a requirement for you to continue your scouting and trapfinding skills.
- You don't have to use travel devotion (for example when tripped). You can just move and single attack. But if you think that way, there are very nice stuff to do using your standard action, or even your move action. The point is to make the character work.
- Dervish needs to move to be effective and only works for melee. Normal swift hunters move 10ft or 20ft if they want to activate improved skirmish. That's easy to do even in cramped situations. Also because you need to move constantly it doesn't mean that your first attack will be a skirmish attack. You need to move 20ft before you activate improved skirmish (so that leaves, assuming 40ft total speed, four attacks).
- Ranged weapons are better for many reasons. What will you do if your opponent flies for example or has a climb speed? You won't be able to dance-full attack every single one of them, while now you've got at least a chance. That applies for enemies who are hard to reach, too, even if they stay on ground. Getting hit is not much of a concern when selecting weapon styles (since you know, you select your offensive style :P).
- A lot of creatures are immune to precision damage
Oozes, plants, undead, elementals, constructs and i may be missing more. Weapon crystals probably work with skirmish (there are two greater for undead and constructs), but that means that the fortification effects block your skirmish. That greatly improves the number of creatures that can block your damage. - Cloistered cleric >> death delver. You don't have to fulfill entry requirements, has high skill points and most importantly, domains. You dip cleric for the travel devotion feat and other goodies. Death delver doesn't have domains.
- People usually prefer high dexterity when using two weapon fighting because two weapon fighting feats (and i am not talking only about the basic TWF feats) need high scores (IIRC greater TWF needs 19 dex, not so easy to get if it isn't one of your primary stats). Anyway, that's not too important. Remember that you get half your strength modifier to damage and that you already do fine damage with skirmish. Also there are swift hunter skills (move silently, hide, tumble, balance, etc) that are keyed off dexterity.
- Dervish requires weapon focus and combat expertise. These two are pretty much worthless to the swift hunter.
Weapon Focus becomes worthless if you let it be worthless. I'm finding a lot of fun with Improved Critical currently.
Assuming that you enter the class at 6+ level (3 scout, 1 ranger, 2 more for BAB), you will be able to dervish dance for each battle at level 11+. That's not early.
3 encounters a day is stretching it usually, and by the 3rd encounter, almost everyone would have limited choices in what they do. I'm currently on level 13 with 2 dervish dances a day and I don't think I feel as though I am inadequate at the end of the day. If all else fails, there's spring attack which dervish provides at level 2.
The fast movement is an enhancement bonus, which doesn't stack with the scout's fast movement.
Lots of enhancement bonuses abound, unless you're looking at Barbarian. Scout provides another 10ft at level 11, which I am not sure if the OP will go until then. Dervish provides another 5ft at level 7 (so um, 3+3+7 = 13). It all ends up with what the OP wants to do - scout or combatant.
The dervish dance lasts for a number of rounds equal to half your ranks in perform, which is a cross class skill for both your entry classes.
I'd admit that 10 ranks I put in (yes I put in 10 ranks) was painful. Heh.
Dervish doesn't progress ranger spells.
I haven't found myself missing the ranger spells yet. Maybe Primal Instinct, but I put it into a 1/day item. Perhaps you know of any ranger spells that would hurt a ranger if he doesn't have it?
Dervish only gives 4+int skill ranks. Remember that swift hunters are not just damage dealers. They are all around characters. This makes able learner a requirement for you to continue your scouting and trapfinding skills.
Then this will depend on the OP's focus of his character. If he intends to be a skill monkey, of course a combatant PrC would not suit him. My character's focus is obviously combatant, with a dash of survival/tracking/knowledge nature to complete the ranger picture. If the OP would prefer a skill monkey, then obviously Dervish would not please him.
That said, I felt very sad when it was recommended that Dervish to be simply tossed aside as a "worthless" PrC, mainly because I DO love my character a lot and I am having immense fun playing her. Of course it's not all about damage output, I do have some skills as a ranger, but the load is split among my party members - I left the trap finding to my party's rogue/wizard. I pretty much do not intend to do everything myself
You don't have to use travel devotion (for example when tripped). You can just move and single attack. But if you think that way, there are very nice stuff to do using your standard action, or even your move action. The point is to make the character work.
If the OP would move and single attack, I would suggest Spring Attack?
Dervish needs to move to be effective and only works for melee. Normal swift hunters move 10ft or 20ft if they want to activate improved skirmish. That's easy to do even in cramped situations. Also because you need to move constantly it doesn't mean that your first attack will be a skirmish attack. You need to move 20ft before you activate improved skirmish (so that leaves, assuming 40ft total speed, four attacks).
It seriously depends on the planning and the party make up of the OP? Previously, I used Boots of Speed to bump my movement to 60ft (free action to activate), so it's 20ft + 40ft (8 attacks). When my party wizard saw my dependancy on haste, he prepared haste. Heh.
Ranged weapons are better for many reasons. What will you do if your opponent flies for example or has a climb speed? You won't be able to dance-full attack every single one of them, while now you've got at least a chance. That applies for enemies who are hard to reach, too, even if they stay on ground. Getting hit is not much of a concern when selecting weapon styles (since you know, you select your offensive style :P).
If the opponent flies, I sure hope my party will help me :D Given tumble does not work while flying, Mobility helps to cover with a +4 AC. As for opponents hard to reach, do you mean like difficult terrain/big threat range? With enough ranks in tumble and wear Boots of the Mountain King, I haven't had any problems with reaching targets on the ground. If I need an extra move action, then that's where items/devotion feats come in?
A lot of creatures are immune to precision damage
If my favored enemies are all against immune precision damage creatures, I think my DM will scold me for metagaming :P It depends on the kind of campaign/background the OP has. My current campaign is shades/undead opponent types mainly, and I do have favored enemy (Undead) after being annoyed with them so many times. Having played from level 3 to level 13, I've only met 3 constructs (which I killed slowly), 2 oozes (1 of them an arcane ooze, the other disposed by the party wizard quick), 1 air elemental (I forgot what we did with him), no plants, and TONNES of undead. Is there a need for the swift hunters to have ALL the favored enemy?
People usually prefer high dexterity when using two weapon fighting because two weapon fighting feats (and i am not talking only about the basic TWF feats) need high scores (IIRC greater TWF needs 19 dex, not so easy to get if it isn't one of your primary stats). Anyway, that's not too important. Remember that you get half your strength modifier to damage and that you already do fine damage with skirmish. Also there are swift hunter skills (move silently, hide, tumble, balance, etc) that are keyed off dexterity.
TWF is free from ranger w/o requirements. If the OP continues ranger, the other TWF feats are all w/o requirements.
I have Improved TWF from Gloves of the Balanced Hand currently, and also wearing Gloves of Dexterity +4. It is not to say that Dex is a dump stat (that is not possible, Cha is my dump stat), IMO there's no need to raise it beyond 19, which a Gloves of Dexterity will cover pretty fine. By the time the OP gets Greater TWF, I sure hope he has amassed enough money to buy one.
That said, I'm seeing a difference in opinions here because we're looking at different aspects of the Swift Hunter. There's a lot of ways a Swift Hunter can be effective, and it all depends on what the OP wants to become. I prefer to have a character that has a main focus on what she wants to be, and the other things are simple the icing on the cake for me. I don't like to build a character that is an entire party on its own, and I believe in party strength to beat that BBEG. Essentially, this boils down to personal preference.
I hope you can see from this POV that a Swift Hunter/Dervish can be a very strong combatant/sideline tracker, which is a suggestion on my side to the OP since I am also currently playing a Swift Hunter. However, if the OP prefers to be a skill monkey/secondary combatant, then of course, none of us would recommend him to be a Dervish.
Swift hunters are skill monkies, utility spellcasters, damage dealers and scouts. Hardly one man party. You are just entering dervish with the ranger and scout base classes, taking the swift hunter feat and just saying that you want to be a melee destroyer. I'm pretty sure that you can do better with another entry. From my point of view, that is not a swift hunter character.
Optimizing and having fun are kinda related. Dervish is a strong prestige class, but i don't like it. The flavor just doesn't fit to me with swift hunter. If you do, great, have fun. I like my trapfinding, skills, spells, greater weapon fighting, favored enemies and 5d6 base skirmish more than the abilities dervish provides. Even if i have to hit targets by activating travel devotion.
Also, the point of flyers and climbers is moot since you still have to be 30ft for ranged to apply skirmish. They would be smart enough to stay further than that which in this case both builds will just have to either contend with ranged atks without skirmish or get items that can make you fly.
Well, I guess you have to play it to know that it really works. Optimization always looks great on paper but sometimes when you start to apply it, you will start to see holes in the build but as you said, its up to the player to make the character work and I agree with that.
I guess, Faeline is just trying to give her experience IRL with a dervish swift hunter class and how it works for her, albeit a little passionate about it too.
But I still do stand by my case that Travel Devotion is not really good if you rely on it too much. In fact, I would prefer you to go greater manyshot for ranged with Law Devotion to bump your to hit. Have Travel Devotion as backup or against high AC monsters where you would want to use Full Attack instead of Greater Manyshot.
I would agree that Cloistered Cleric is way better than Death Delver in terms of optimization but I guess I was giving an option since not all of us play in campaigns that do not have multi classing penalties (which is RAW IIRC).
Actually, have the OP decided on what he wants yet so we can progress to critiquing his build instead? :P
1. Campaign matters. If you want theoritical go to the THEORITICAL Op Board.
2. Take the Alternate Class feature from PHB2 and get a climb movement rate
3. Optimization can only take place with limits, however those limits are chosen they should still be abided by, otherwise why play any class that doesn't cast spells?
4. What d3f4ult said.
I guess in optimization perspective, I am just pointing out that using a swift action per round do somewhat limit your character. And if you don't, you will have to contend to either 1 atk + skirmish or full atk no skirmish.
Also, the point of flyers and climbers is moot since you still have to be 30ft for ranged to apply skirmish. They would be smart enough to stay further than that which in this case both builds will just have to either contend with ranged atks without skirmish or get items that can make you fly.
Well, I guess you have to play it to know that it really works. Optimization always looks great on paper but sometimes when you start to apply it, you will start to see holes in the build but as you said, its up to the player to make the character work and I agree with that.
I guess, Faeline is just trying to give her experience IRL with a dervish swift hunter class and how it works for her, albeit a little passionate about it too.
But I still do stand by my case that Travel Devotion is not really good if you rely on it too much. In fact, I would prefer you to go greater manyshot for ranged with Law Devotion to bump your to hit. Have Travel Devotion as backup or against high AC monsters where you would want to use Full Attack instead of Greater Manyshot.
I would agree that Cloistered Cleric is way better than Death Delver in terms of optimization but I guess I was giving an option since not all of us play in campaigns that do not have multi classing penalties (which is RAW IIRC).
Actually, have the OP decided on what he wants yet so we can progress to critiquing his build instead? :P
There is a price to pay. You can select 1 feat or take a 10 level prestige. But from an optimization side, the first is better.
Why, flyers can't fly within 30ft? If they don't, well, you can't do anything. At least you get a chance when flight speed is not possible.
I play that one right now.
Yeah, i got that :P
Law devotion won't cover for 3 encounters/day (needs to spend 3 turn undead attempts). You also need to take more feats, when with travel devotion you're set. Also law devotion limits you only to bows, when the greatest weapon is probably gloves of endless javelins (MIC).
cleric 2/scout 3/ranger all the way, no multiclassing penalties.
What he decided on? I missed that.
Ok this is just plain silly,
1. Campaign matters. If you want theoritical go to the THEORITICAL Op Board.
2. Take the Alternate Class feature from PHB2 and get a climb movement rate
3. Optimization can only take place with limits, however those limits are chosen they should still be abided by, otherwise why play any class that doesn't cast spells?
4. What d3f4ult said.
- Who talked about infinite loops and theoritical stuff? Can you point it out please? Everyone here mentioned playable things.
- That's an option. In fact i've taken the alternative feature in my build, too.
- Right, the limits are "scout/ranger with TWF and shadowdancer (which doesn't probably work) and no catfolk". Where does it say "no spells"?
- No comment.
Am I the only one that finds travel devotion kind of silly with skirmish? It just feels too easy.
Its the feat that fixes Skirmish. It should be a bonus feat for Scouts though, which is my gripe with it.
So, yeah, it does make skirmishing kind of easy, but there are lots of killer feats/combos out there (we're looking at you Shocktrooper). Also, I'd rather someone use that than the Cyran Gliding Boots or the Sparrying Dummy.