AMIA ARCHIVE • View topic - Build: Fighter/BG/Rogue aka the boring 12/2/16

Human
fighter 12/rogue 2/BG 16
LE

STR 16 -> 20
DEX 8
CON 14
INT 10
WIS 14
CHA 14 -> 18

R1 1 Strong Soul, Power Attack
R1/F1 2 Cleave
R1/F2 3 Wep. Prof Exotic, Wep. Focus Bastard
R1/F4 5 Wep. Spec. Bastard
R1/F5 6 Toughness
R1/F6 7 Great Cleave (? maybe)
R1/F6/BG2 9 Improved Critical
R1/F6/BG5 12 Divine Might
R1/F6/BG8 15 Divine Shield
R1/F7/BG10 18 Blindfight
R1/F8/BG10 19 Extra Smiting (? maybe)
R1/F10/BG10 21 Epic Wep. Focus Bastard, Epic. Wep. Spec. Bastard
R1/F10/BG13 24 Great STR 1, Epic Prowess
R2/F10/BG15 27 Epic Fortitude
R2/F10/BG16 28 Epic Fiendish Servant
R2/F12/BG16 30 Armor Skin + (??? no idea)

Skills: Max Discipline, Tumble, UMD, +1. idk. Spot. Lore. Concentration. Kinda w/e here. Wish i had room for more int.

Feats: No Dev, basic almost bard level str/cha split.

~~

working on the character concept, but decided to play with the numbers first. I've got a number of open feats that aren't really being used for anything critical and nothing better to use them on. The order's probably not totally well done either, mostly just slapped together in single player. I'd rather stay plain jane human, I think, no subraces here.

He's going to be a basic full plate tower shield tumbletank, his AB is going to be short because he's not a dever nor a cleric/paladin and there's a first level of rogue to get the x4 skillpoints because I was running tight. Not sure how to change these things without uprooting the build or giving up a lot of the wisdom; I rather like to have the BG toys to play with.

If you got any idea let me know!!

Yeah it is a really tight build since you are going Divine Might/shield + strength route. So no IKD or anything.

The only thing I might suggest is shift two con points to dex. That way you can pop a dex potion and are always guaranteed max AC (That is just personal preference though). As for the last Epic feat I would suggest snagging Epic Skill Focus (Disc) to make up for your less than stellar str mod (Also the fact there really isn't any other good epic feats to grab).

Personally, I'd drop the 2 Con and put that into INT so you can get an extra Maxed Skill in, and I'd swap Strong Soul and Great cleave for Knockdown and IKD, Because Great cleave is a feat that's essentially useless unless you want Dev Crit, which you don't get.

Either way, You'll still be pretty well off!

He would have to drop at least 3 to slide it into INT. Which means he might as well move all 4 into INT instead of con. It isn't a bad idea though. IKD is pretty nice, definitely since you wont be having Dev Crit.

Maverick, no need to put more points into Dex due to Abyssal Might's Dex bonus stacking with potions.

You can go 12CON - 12INT for more skill points if you want.
You can go 15STR - 13INT and grab Greater STR 1 if you want more skill points and Imp KD.
You can push back Rogue levels to epic for maximum AB progression at the cost of 5 skill points. (5 Cross classed hide) And late UMD/Tumble (Harder leveling time)
You can grab Epic Prowess in Epic levels for one more AB

I already pick up great STR 1 to even out STR since I push CHA to 18 for an even +10 bonus. I also already get Prowess.

Removing the rogue lvl 1 loses me a lot more than 5 SP since not only do i need to full crossclass Hide, but I lose the 8x4 multiplier you get for having rogue at level 1. That's a lot of SP.

If you're completely lost on what that bonus feat should be, you could always drop 2 Fighter levels and Add a Blackguard and Rogue level.

It would be nice because you could take 2 Rogue levels pre-epic and have evasion for the most part of leveling (Which is awesome ) And you'd get an extra d6 Sneak Damage. Only downfall is you lose that extra epic feat, but Eh, It could be worse.

I'm actually planning to roll a Blackguard soon-ish with a build very similar to this, I could always PM or skype it to you if you'd like some inspiration!

I'd go for extra turning instead of extra smiting, smiting on a BG is pretty meh.

I'd drop strong soul for knockdown. And great cleave for IKD if you pushed INT up to 13 somehow. Great cleave itself is pretty useless, so maybe even just a skill focus instead, or lightning reflexes to, since that's your low save and you're getting evasion.

I think you're missing the fighter feat at F12. Could drop armor skin for two more epic Great STR's (though I like the AC myself). Or drop those last two fighter levels for rogue, for extra skill points, plus you could get evasion earlier in epic.

Drop toughness and great cleave for knock down/ improved knock down. Your choice about the con/int. You will already be rolling with higher health than the 10 rogue/4 fighter/16 bg. Dex is fine at 8. Abyssal might will make it to where you can pop a potion and be at your max dex bonus with full plate. Extra turning is better than extra smiting only as a convenience in pve. For pvp, you're gonna want as many smites to squash those do gooders quickly.

IKD is more useful, if only to utilize the sexy BG snk damage. So yeah, I'd wiggle it in there.

I'm always a fan of more skill points, but I don't really think you need much more here. Spot is fine on that last skill.

It's a fun build that can get a fun 75 AC in expertise mode, and a respectable attack bonus. When you use divine might and sneak attack in conjunction your damage goes up close to WM levels, and the Amnizu for Lawful Evil is objectively the strongest summon in the module.

Unfortunately this build is outclassed in every way by it's epic dodging counterpart: Rogue13/Blackguard16/RangerorMonk 1. Strength based blackguards aren't very good, and I would know since I player one for two years, they get very few spells that make them worthwhile and their ability to tank isn't really much to write home about since their AC usually gets nullified in NWN by the way combat works. NWN likes flat footing people and in events lag will usually kill your lack of epic dodge, incredible con, or sneak/crit immunity. It's not a build that excels at anything, but it's okay at a lot of things.

If you want my mechanical feedback, I'll list it as follows:

-Go longsword even though bastard swords are cooler, use that feat for great fortitude to save yourself some gear strain from having to deal with MASD so much
-Drop Strong Soul for Luck of Heroes if you really want extra saves. But I wouldn't even do that.
-If you're dropping strong soul I would take Knockdown and Improved Knockdown
-Improved Expertise allows you to reach a solid 80 AC

My feat spread for your build would probably look like this:

1 Bind Fight, Great Fortitude, Iron Will
3 Power Attack
6 Cleave
9 Improved Critical
12 Divine Might
15 Divine Shield
18 Extra Turning
F 1 Expertise
F 2 Weapon Focus
F 4 Weapon Specialization
F 6 Knockdown
F 8 Improved Knockdown

21 Great Strength I
24 Epic Fortitude
27 Epic Will
30 Epic Prowess
F 10 Epic Weapon Focus
F 12 Epic Weapon Specialization
BG 13 Armor Skin
BG 16 Epic Fiendish Servant

The great and epic will feats will do a lot for your build that you normally don't have at all. You're getting a net gain of +7 will which is about the only save your really lack. Your will save will manage to get to about 33 when you max out your charisma score, and that is not taking into account any gear you might put into it. Though I wouldn't recommend gearing into will personally. If you want to be "that person" you could switch my two recommended feats from Will to Reflex and have a character who's more likely to actually survive stuff by having a 35 reflex and just mindblank if will saves become an issue. It works really well, but I would personally just recommend you go for an epic dodge build instead. You do a lot of damage, get an awesome epic fiend tank, and you have the added bonus of epic dodge to give you actual damage mitigation where Divine Shield would simply fall short on you, giving you an extra feat you don't even need to take.

If you would like a dex build, let me know and I'll write one up for you. They are phenomenal.

Edit: I would recommend a better ability score spread but blackguard is just terrible when you go strength. I would know, I mained one for two years and they just aren't very good. Do what you feel will work.

Where's blindfight?

Att level 18, you see it there.

EEdit: O, you mean his, not mine.

Blind Fight over Extra Turning I reckon.

Oh, right. I knew I was missing something there. The simplest solution is to remove luck of heroes in it's place, I'll edit it to reflect that.

Extra Turing is just nice because it's the closest the Blackguard gets to having longevity.

I would consider switching con and int around and taking Imp. KD, Imp. Expertise and Extra turning in place of Strong Soul, Toughness, Extra Smiting, Weap. Prof Exotic and Great Cleave.

Ofcourse the character concept changes quite a bit by dumping the bastard sword and trading Con to Int, but from a building perspective it is worth considering that your summon can still flank while you are tanking with Imp. Expertise, and Imp KD really helps even out your low AB.

Perhaps consider investing extra skillpoints in Taunt and Spellcraft?

Edit: Ah, forgot to mention that you will also have 6d6 sneak, further boosting the usefulnes of Imp. KD.

You are about the 5th person I see recommend Expertise to me lately. Did my brain explode and Expertise got useful? In my day it just turned itself off and got you killed...

Expertise can be useful in the right situations, but you'll have to be careful with it.

While this proposal is a bit more revolutionary than the other tweaks, have you considered a Dex-based 13 Rogue/1 Fighter/ 16 Blackguard mix? An epic-dodge, towershield duelist. Functions similar to the Dex-WM's but has all the juicy blackguard toys and higher sneak damage. If you're set on strength-based, that's certainly doable but I wasn't sure if you were open to considering other alternatives.

With all the robe options available, you can still look like a well-armored soldier with a kind of phalanx sword and shield.

Expertise is more popular than it used to be. I don't know why IE is, that really takes it too far. Really high ACs seem to be the thing lately.

Some situations where Imp. Expertise gets handy are:

True Strike chuggers in PvP(Or in this case Paladin Smiters) which exhaust their high AB quickly, letting you disable Imp. Exp and then start hitting back.
Running to ranged things while they're filling you up with arrows/bolts/whatever(Again, disable when you close in).
Acting as the tank for your summon(Disable/Active as the focus of whatever you're fighting changes).
Running away and clicking it on(Although this is a bit harder to use).
Chugging a True Strike potion yourself and clicking it on to make use of that one round of +10 AC/AB.
Using it in place of Diving Shield when you run out of Turn Undead or don't have time to cast it.

Of course that still leaves you with the normal expertise for situations where you can actually keep it on for the whole fight, but that's how I've mainly used the feat.

Expertise is useful in bad fights during DM events where you don't want to waste all of your uses of turn undead. It can get quite difficult to maintain your charges in long drawn out situations. Your AC is still high enough to hit most NPCs while in expertise mode, and when you're in a really bad spot you can haste, use divine might, and activate expertise.

Meh. I've only ever seen Impro Expertise really be used for certain boss fights, or those verrry rare stupid high ab builds. Generally I avoid it and its lesser form like the plague because there is almost always a better feat to take instead of it.

Pah, you're all wussies: Power attack all day every day. It can't hit you if it's DEAD!

Also BG spells count as CL 16(Or BG level) spells and will get hit by dispel harshly, so bear that in mind. Shouldn't affect your potion/item buffs tho, those remain unaffected by Greater Dispel.

Blackguard widgets don't dispell like regular spells if you have no caster level, so that's not true. It's a flaw in Neverwinter Nights.

Yeah, the widget buffs go pop from dispels that most potions easily resist. They're extremely fragile.

The last three posts seem to disagree. Can we make those clearer?

Will BG buffs dispel at BG level, or at non-caster level like potions (assuming no other caster levels)

I would assume the latter, since BG's don't have a spellbook and the NWN bug that substitutes character level in dispels for caster level in characters that have no caster levels.

Custom scripted things seem to run off their own deal, since I distinctly remember Torin's psi powers being dispelled at the drop of a hat.

If you have caster levels under level 24 and a requisite caster stat for it of 10 or higher, then you are able to be dispelled. If you have a negative caster stat, your CL remains unmodified and this your buffs can only be dispelled by a disjunction or other spells like spell breach that aren't dependent on CL.

It generally makes dispel magic and it's varients pointless when dealing with epic level fighters.

tl;dr: NWN has weird quirks

bobofwestoregonusa wrote:

If you have caster levels under level 24 and a requisite caster stat for it of 10 or higher, then you are able to be dispelled.

*sigh* No. You keep bringing up this wonky dispel system, and it doesnt work that way. The reason you have 24 caster levels is to be immune to greater dispel. It's not weird, it's math. Heck, if you have 19 caster levels you're immune to "dispel magic".

bobofwestoregonusa wrote:

If you have a negative caster stat, your CL remains unmodified and this your buffs can only be dispelled by a disjunction or other spells like spell breach that aren't dependent on CL.

Not true. The buffs by potions are treated as your "character" level if you don't have any caster levels in your build. If a pure rogue uses umd and casts from a scroll, the buff provided will be at the caster level the scroll is. It has nothing to do with your caster stat. Potions are the only thing that are weird because they will scale up to your character level.

bobofwestoregonusa wrote:

It generally makes dispel magic and it's variants pointless when dealing with epic level fighters.

If the character is less than level 24, then greater dispel can strip you of your buffs. Not pointless, but a corner case.

bobofwestoregonusa wrote:

tl;dr: NWN has weird quirks

Yes we agree here. However you're making it a lot more complicated than it has to be.

None of what you said was actually contradictory to what I said. I didn't bother mentioning the fact that you need 24 Caster Levels or that you need a minimum character level of 24 because Tormak seems like he knows that much. I was talking about the weird quirk NWN has where if you have cool classes like Bard for their neat skill selection of Tumble, Use Magic Device, Spellcraft, and Discipline (bard is easily the best class to pepper into a build if you can get a ring of improved evasion) and you have a caster stat for that class of under 10 then don't get a caster level.

So to put it simply:

Caster Class and caster stat of 10+? Your Caster Level (CL) is your caster class level.

Caster Class and your caster stat is 9 or lower? Your Caster Level is not modified, and remains at your character level.

This is also why people with 9 Ranger levels and a negative Wisdom modifier don't get completely screwed by mind flayers. I've got no idea what you're being so disagreeing with me so hard about here, but you certainly disagree with something I'm saying. You might say what it is you're disagreeing with me on here instead of breaking what I say down into bullet points because I'm not catching it. I'm pretty sure we both agree about the CL 24 thing though, no one ever denied that.

Bit late to this, but Bob is correct, if your Caster stat is below 10, you're safe. To note: my BG with 1 dip in ranger and 8 wis has NEVER been dispelled by greater dispells. Also the BG feats (Bulls, Eagles, etc.) seem immune to it as well.

kolde wrote:

Bit late to this, but Bob is correct, if your Caster stat is below 10, you're safe. To note: my BG with 1 dip in ranger and 8 wis has NEVER been dispelled by greater dispells. Also the BG feats (Bulls, Eagles, etc.) seem immune to it as well.

Yurp, just tested these both and it holds out. Can anyone find a reference from NWNwiki on this? I wonder if there's a rule to this, or if it's just arbitrary. It could be that being able to cast spells makes one a spellcaster, hence using that spellcaster level to determine the caster level for spells from potions, wands and items. Following this logic, Ranger wouldn't be determining the CL against dispel until level 4 even with WIS 11 or above.

If the BG widget spells' dispellability is a problem, it could be fixed by making them into class feats, alike Eagle's that has been added for the class subsequently, should the mechanics allow it.

Build: Fighter/BG/Rogue aka the boring 12/2/16

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