AMIA ARCHIVE • View topic - The Official Teach a Man to Fish topic (Build topic):

Yeah, they work how you expect them to. You might just be unlucky with the engine's % roll, because mine work fine. If there's no % - I think it only forces the save once, or until the save is failed. I remember hunting the FGK and every now and then, poison on my throwing knives would go off, and then no further saves were made.

Doesn't the Black Blade work like a no percentage On Hit effect and doesn't that force a roll every time it hits? Maybe it uses a special script that's unique to that spell? I don't know

That it might be "until the save is failed" after all - after which point the target is too dead to take any more hits.

Yo! I wonder if anyone would be willing to 'help' (aka do all the work since i suck horridly at it) build a 'duelist' type character as asked here: viewtopic.php?f=2&t=75967&p=1253959#p1253959

toss me a message if you do!

A wm/monk springs to mind with a rapier / bastard sword. You'd loose monk attack bonus but still retain the ac/ speed and even get improved knockdown for free

What was tormaks build now again?

Torin was famously(?) a monk 6/Fighter 8/WM 16. Due to the level spread I had to take monk pre epic to kill me out of 20 BAB, to enable me to have enough Fighter in epic to get the epic feats I needed. Knowing this, I took monk at 1st level to get the base saves and the bonus skill points. Pre Epic on Torin was 4 monk/6 fighter/10 WM iirc, since if you have to take 1 level of monk pre epic, you might as well take the block of 4, since 3/4ths BAB classes don't lose the extra BAB point until 5th level. Having Cleave/Evasion earlier on helps levelling too, along w/ the saves. Epic is 2/2/6.

You can minmax the build a bit harder than I did by going to minimum dexterity and intelligence but I chose to go 17 STR not 18 and have slightly higher dex and int. This meant I needed an extra great strength to get Dev Crit and, as Ruce and Pige like to remind me... It cost me Epic Prowess, so my AB sits at a pissfucking annoying 49 and not a cathartic, relaxing 50.

Having the monk levels is fun, you get the monk shit for free and it makes you run fas and have wisdom AC in cloth. It means when I'm lazy I can cruise around most areas in clothes and run faster, but not have the tumbletank issue of having Absolutely No AC. Being able to fight unarmed also meshed well with being a Soulknife who only has a layer of psychic energy between his enemies and the bare flesh of his hand.

That said: It's absolutely worse mechanically than the old 10/2/16 fighter/rogue/WM standard, IMO. I don't get UMD. That's like the crux of the argument there. I do get a lot of feats free that make it easier to go into WM, but losing UMD is crippling in a game world like Amia's.

Torin used full plate but I ponced around enough with clothes to know it'd be doable. It'd not be great but it'd be doable. You'd need the monk spread of stats though, which means like everything in the game. you'd probably want rapier so you could finesse it, to give you one less stat you need. You'd be a dex fighter without sneak attack but at least you'd have Wep Spec/ Epic Spec. Fun, yeah, amazing? Not so much.

The Epic Dodger WM sounds more like it to me. Works best with an Air Genasii or Chultan human because they can start at 19DEX and get that free feat.

Ftr5/Rogue4/WM7, in that order, then Rogue levels till 20, so you begin epic at on Ftr5/WM7/Rogue12

1: Dodge
Ftr1: Mobility
1: Weapon Focus
Frt2: Expertise
3: Weapon Finesse
Ftr4: Weapon Specialisation
6 Spring Attack
9 Whirlwind Attack
12 Knockdown
15 Improved Crits
18 Blindfight

Rogue bonus feats: 10: Improved Evasion, 13: Defensive Roll, 16: Epic Dodge

In epic you go to Ftr6/WM7/Rogue17

21: Armourskin
24: Epic Weapon Focus
27: [optional]
30: [optional] and Ftr6: Epic Weapon Specialisation. It's a bit painful to wait until now to get Epic Spec, but you can't top up Discipline any other way.

Because you've got two optional epic feats, the build will work with any race that doesn't have an actual DEX penalty: you'll just need to start at 18DEX rather than 19, and swap Epic Focus at 24 for Great DEX to reach 26DEX in time to take Epic Dodge. You only need 25 to get Epic Dodge, but not evening out your primary stat is silly, so you will. You then need to use the other optional feat for Blindfight, which is painful on the grounds of being a pre-epic feat taken in epic, but not as painful as not having Blindfight.

It's one of the best builds I've ever used.

Yeah. Epic dodge is kinda sick...

Only downside of that build is that your gearscore is kinda crammed: you need 10 dex(12 with pot) 10 con (12 with pot) and 10 STR (12 with pot) ;[strength is optional]

A normal STR focused fighter/wm doesn't have the same difficulties

I never bothered maxing CON out, and +12ing two stats is pretty easy if you have multiple items for casting, which you do for STR in the form of Bull boots.

kalcibone wrote:

Yo! I wonder if anyone would be willing to 'help' (aka do all the work since i suck horridly at it) build a 'duelist' type character as asked here: viewtopic.php?f=2&t=75967&p=1253959#p1253959

toss me a message if you do!

You could try a Fighter/WM/Dwarven Defender (7/5/18). Since parry doesn't work as it should and since you'll be attacked by more than just one attacker you're gonna get hit a lot so you might as well minimize the damage you take. You're starting stats would look like this

STR: 14
DEX: 15 --> 18
CON: 18 --> 21 pre epic and 22 in epic levels
WIS: 8
INT: 14
CHA: 6

Take 6 Fighter/5WM/9DwD pre epic and leave the last fighter level for epic levels(for level 30 I guess)
You would take the feats required for the prestige classes first so: Dodge, Toughness, Mobility, Expertise, Weapon Focus, Spring Attack, Whirlwind attack, then you can take Weapon finesse, Skill focus: Parry and I don't know.. whatever else you want if you get more feats to choose from. In epic levels take Epic Damage reduction I,II and III as soon as you can, EWF and ESF: Parry.

You'll want to get Enkidu's Armor and Cordor Conscript Helm as soon as possible cause they give you 5/- damage reduction against slashing, piercing and bludgeoning and it stacks with your DwD damage resistance and with epic damage resistance. You don't need to worry about armor class so you'll have plenty of room to customize your gear. I would suggest you look for yellow rings that give 10/- or higher elemental damage resistance and that's about it.

You'll have 700-ish hp and 26 damage resistance, nice saves and decent damage. Hope that helps.

EDIT: Now that I think about it you could probably ditch Skil Focus: Parry and Epic SKill Focus: Parry since like I said, you'll have plenty of room to customize gear through the mythal system and you can take some other feats instead. (Knockdown and Disarm maybe)

How much UMD dump for barb fighter rogue?

33 is the same as 30 and I think 25 is enough to use pretty much any item you want. If you just want to be able to use scrolls I think 10 or 15 would be enough. Bypassing alignment and class restrictions requires 25 I think

5 reads cheap scrolls,
10 reads all scrolls,
15 wears almost all class restricted items
20 wears all class restricteds
25 wears almost all alignment restricteds
30 does everything.

25 does everything actually! Otherwise you were correct!

Dang it. Lily will get 18 max without equipment, unless I remove points from discipline, which I probably should not do.

It's not a problem. A bit of equipment twiddling might feel arduous, but it's worth it. Also, be sure to add your CHA mod into equation.

Uncle-Opustus wrote:

It's not a problem. A bit of equipment twiddling might feel arduous, but it's worth it. Also, be sure to add your CHA mod into equation.

Oh, right, its a charisma skill. That makes it 23 when I remembered to cast Eagle's Splendor. Not bad at all after all, though I dunno what happens when eagle's splendor runs out and I am wielding somthing with UMD.

You still have it equipped. But if you remove it you can't put it back xD

It sticks. That's why it's called equipment twiddling in the first place, which makes it border on exploitation: UMD 15. Required 20 for item. Put +5 UMD ammy on. Put on item. Take off +5 ammy. It's a sham, but I'm not Justin Bieber bitch.

What spells is Empower Spell good for? Planning a sorc and will likely take it, but I'm not sure on how best to use it. Fireball? Ice Storm?

I know Spell Mantel is better than Greater Spell Mantle when empowered.

IGMS. Delayed blast fireball? Ice storm. Spell mantle. Lesser spell mantle.

Empower spell is mostly used for offensive purposes: maximize for defensive/offensive (Buffing or shooting a maxed IGMS)

You can empower stat buffs too, if the spellslots suit you

Ah, good points. Nice to know!

The good thing about it is that it's two levels above the normal version, and no other feat puts a casting there.

For example, level 7 tends to be the sacred ground of Extended Mass Haste, so should you wish to spam a beefed up Ice Storm in the Underkingdom, you still can.

It's in the same vein as taking Still or Silent Spell purely to get more castings/day or to stop them clashing with a better spell.

Empowering stat buffs is pretty sexy on a spontaneous caster. Not for your CHA; you need the solidity of the +5 Maximo Park, but the rest of your party, pets especially, and rest of your stats will likely benefit.

I'm having an issue understanding sorcerers and bonus spell slots.

So my sorc is level 7 with a 17 CHA, which means she gets 7 circle 2 spells per day (6 from levels, 1 from CHA). So I bought a Savant Belt which gives a bonus sorc slot of circle 2. I put it on, and I still only had 7 uses of my circle 2 spells. I rested and then I had 8 uses. Is this right? I thought you could swap out gear as needed? Or does that only work with CHA items?

You would have an infinite amount of spell uses per day if it worked without resting.

Spellslots need resting.

Polris wrote:

You would have an infinite amount of spell uses per day if it worked without resting.

Hah, good point! I didn't even consider that, so yeah that makes sense XD

Kamina wrote:

Spellslots need resting.

So even as Sorc you have to put all your CHA/spellslot gear on, then rest and cast, then remove it all? I was under the impression you could add the gear after you rested, then cast.

No, it has to be equipped.

And if you unequip, you lose the spell slots it would offer!

Last edited by bidocks on Sat, Mar 15 2014, 16:03 PM, edited 1 time in total.

Question:

If a character can achieve 59 AC and 45 AB as a cleric, which would be a better choice for feat: armor skin or epic prowess?

The AC does not include haste or expertise, which will both be available, and the AB does not include divine favor/power.

Thanks in advance....

-B

Alrighty that's all well and good with me. I just wanted to make sure I had a handle on how it worked haha.

bidocks wrote:

Question:

If a character can achieve 59 AC and 45 AB as a cleric, which would be a better choice for feat: armor skin or epic prowess?

The AC does not include haste or expertise, which will both be available, and the AB does not include divine favor/power.

Thanks in advance....

-B

Normally the more AC the better, but that seems like some glorious AC already. I'd vote for Epic Prowess probably. And I am jealous of the build haha.

On the topic of more AC vs more AB, should I forgo epic prowess to get expertise? It's a balanced paladin so it'll have good ab and ac no matter what.

Charisma is the cruel mistress of bonus casting because as Rigela says, if you remove a bonus slot item, it removes one casting per day at that level.

If you then reequip it, you gain no further castings until rest, which is fair enough and the same as every other caster, but if you then unequip it a second time, it will still remove a casting per day at that level.

That doesn't happen with anyone else - you can sit with the spellbook open and merrily flip a bonus item on and off and you'll see the empty square blinking in and out of existence on the right hand side, but if you do that with a Sorc or Bard, you'd very swiftly have no castings at all of that level.

The real bastard is that you also suffer this effect with CHA items even if you are swapping two items with the same bonus; as far as it's concerned, you've gone down by x and then back up by x, so it'll remove spells/day at two or three levels. The way to avoid this is to take yourself up to +12+x and then swap. It's an infuriatingly easy thing to forget.

TL;DR version: you can take a freshly rested Sorc or Bard down to zero castings of any spells purely by unequipping and requipping all their kit a few times.

Uberuce wrote:

If you then reequip it, you gain no further castings until rest, which is fair enough and the same as every other caster, but if you then unequip it a second time, it will still remove a casting per day at that level.

That doesn't happen with anyone else - you can sit with the spellbook open and merrily flip a bonus item on and off and you'll see the empty square blinking in and out of existence on the right hand side, but if you do that with a Sorc or Bard, you'd very swiftly have no castings at all of that level.

XD That's weird as all get out haha.

I'll probably just stick to maxing Eagle's and casting that first, heh. It's still weird, though, because I thought you could cast Eagle's for a CHA bonus and get more slots. It's stupid that it doesn't work like that. Of course, I guess you could just cheat and drink a pot, get the slot, debuff, rinse/repeat. Grumble.

Yes, the Maxed Eagle instinct is one of the most important ones to cultivate.

For the above reasons I keep enough CHA gear on my Sorc so that he has +12 without casting anything, that's the only way to maximize spells per day. It also makes the CHA ioun stone not as useful for a Sorc as you would think, b/c you have to have the +12 going into rest to get max spells.

vidar999 wrote:

For the above reasons I keep enough CHA gear on my Sorc so that he has +12 without casting anything, that's the only way to maximize spells per day. It also makes the CHA ioun stone not as useful for a Sorc as you would think, b/c you have to have the +12 going into rest to get max spells.

Isn't that the same for wizards? Without max gear at rest, you're not getting max spells per day. The repeated loss of spells is good to know about, though.

Other question: Is called shot any good? I would think so, but spawns have high discipline to resist knockdown, and the checks are somewhat similar. (Improved KD has a higher DC than Called Shot against Large and smaller creatures, unless I'm mistaken.) I guess against things that can't be KDed due to size or immunity, Called Shot wins, but otherwise? In particular in teen levels where most things are KDable except for their discipline, I wasn't impressed by Called Shot at all.

Regards
Ts

It's rubbish compared to Knockdown. The main selling point is that it works with ranged weapons, and the secondary selling point is that it doesn't respect size modifiers and there's no item/hide immunity, so less things are immune.

And yep, I'm not totally sure I understand why the CHA stone is any poorer than the INT/WIS ones. Every caster rests at +12, casts Maxed Fox/Owl/Eagle and then swaps in better gear, so the Ioun allows you swap +7's worth rather than +5. Seems the same across the board to me.

Ucebutt beat me to it. If you can effect something with Called Shot, you could have effected it with KD, which is better in most cases because it keeps things from attacking back, and you get a few bonuses to prone enemies. Called Shot: Leg is good with ranged weapons, because it allows you to kite easier. I could see that working with some sort of corner-sneak maybe, if you're going to be running away and ambushing a lot.

I took it on my STR Monk just because it was fun to RP beating the ever-loving crap out of something in every way possible before knocking it on its back and beheading it with a throat chop.

Edit: Another thing that I found works pretty good with Empower: Color Spray. Will is a pretty low save for most things, even into Epic, and it is sometimes hard to find a use for lv 3 slots, if you're not using Extended Stat buffs. Vampiric Touch isn't too back either. I find it more preferable to the maximized, which takes slots away from Empowered Ice Storm.

Hi again~! I'm lookin' for a useful Archer build (since i tried once and faaaaailed.) People keep pointing me at AA but i'm not sure really so i need help xD

Suggestions?

The only time where another feat outshines Improved knockdown is when you grab a large weapon and take Improved Disarm: But even then it's not nearly as good. One good example is that everybody can be knocked down, but only melee characters suffer from a disarmed weapon - Not casters.

Why is improved disarm better in some cases then?
Specifics: The character can attempt to disarm an opponent in melee combat. Attempting a disarm applies a -6 penalty to the character's attack roll, and the combatant with the larger weapon gains a +4 bonus per size category of difference. A successful hit deals normal damage, and if the opponent fails a discipline check then the weapon flies from the opponent's hands.

A +4 bonus per size category?
A large weapon vs a medium weapon means -4 + 4 = +0 AB
A large weapon vs a small weapon = -4 + 8 = +4 AB
A large weapon vs a tiny weapon = -4 + 12 = +8 AB

This attack bonus is applied to your attack bonus - So if you have to little Ab to disarm an enemy with a large bonus the bonus AB can help you disarm the opponent with a small or tiny weapon.
The extra AB makes you land higher DC disarms and hit opponents with more AC then your AB (Mainly dexxers, which often use small and tiny weapons)

But this also means you need a two-handed weapon and that means you forgo your shield; which is -7/-8 AC right away. It could potentially work with Monkey-grip.

Quite interesting, Isn't it?

Last edited by Silvarus on Mon, Mar 17 2014, 13:31 PM, edited 3 times in total.

kalcibone wrote:

Hi again~! I'm lookin' for a useful Archer build (since i tried once and faaaaailed.) People keep pointing me at AA but i'm not sure really so i need help xD

Suggestions?

AA if you are an elf, but you can make pretty decent archers by taking paladin or cleric levels and using divine might for damage. Extra shenanigans from Zen Archery and/or monk levels. The problem of archery in general is low damage, so the core of an archer build is in how to increase that. AA's get enchant arrow and AA arrows that give a decent AB and damage. Divine might adds a solid +10 to +14 divine damage to your all attacks, which is the other way to make an archer hurt his enemies. Divine might users need to jump trough more hoops to get good AB though. Other than these two options, I don't really see archer builds working. Sorry, rangers. EDIT: Oh yeah, sneak attacks fix the problem of low damage too.

Arcane archers on the other hand are straightforward to build. Pick a full-bab-class and a caster class. Take a few levels of this warrior class, add a level or two of the caster, and then dump everything into AA. For example, I just made a character with the plan of going 5 fighter 2 bard till lvl 7. Then taking 10 levels of AA and filling that to 6 fighter and 4 bard by 20, and at epics going all out on AA again until a skill dump bard level at the end.

Feats that archers absolutely need: Weapon focus, rapid shot, point blank shot, improved critical, called shot, blind fight. That is not a lot of feats, so there is some room to diversify.
Feats that are also good: Dodge, Weapon Finesse and maybe Mobility

Fire up the build module, and see what works for you. The simplest possible build is probably Fighter10/wizard1/AA19, but that loses out on a tumble/umd dump and spells.

I prefer 10Fighter/2Bard/18 AA - Gains 30 Tumble ( AND UMD! ) instead of 10/15 tumble. That's another +3 AC at the cost of +1AB/+1Damage the 19 AA gives you.
The only time you use wizard/Sorcerer is when you use Monk as your base-class in an Arcane Arcane build.

Last edited by Silvarus on Mon, Mar 17 2014, 13:22 PM, edited 1 time in total.

Very_Svensk wrote:

I prefer 10Fighter/2Bard/18 AA - Gains 30 Tumble ( AND UMD! ) instead of 10/15. That's another +3 AC at the cost of +1AB/+1Damage the 19 AA gives you.

Uh, just lose some of those fighter levels at that point. I'd take the +1AB and +1Damage over EWS probably and at that point you could just as well add more bard, since you have an overabundance of feats to play with in the first place. Thats how you end up with the build I am actually using, but that is significantly less simple and straightforward than that example I gave.

I was told A fighter-rogue would also be good, this true? if so, how?

Silvarus wrote:

Very_Svensk wrote:

I prefer 10Fighter/2Bard/18 AA - Gains 30 Tumble ( AND UMD! ) instead of 10/15. That's another +3 AC at the cost of +1AB/+1Damage the 19 AA gives you.

Uh, just lose some of those fighter levels at that point. I'd take the +1AB and +1Damage over EWS probably and at that point you could just as well add more bard, since you have an overabundance of feats to play with in the first place. Thats how you end up with the build I am actually using, but that is significantly less simple and straightforward than that example I gave.

The arcane archer already rolls around with 55+ Attack bonus. Lowering it a notch in favour of more damage should be prioritized.

24 BAB + 14 DEX MOD = 38 + 5 GMW = 43 + EWF = 46 + 9 Arcane archer AB = 56 + Epic prowess = 57. (58 if you had 15 DEX Modifier) (59 If you had 19 Arcane Archer levels)

More info about Arcane Archers here

Last edited by Silvarus on Mon, Mar 17 2014, 13:34 PM, edited 3 times in total.

kalcibone wrote:

I was told A fighter-rogue would also be good, this true? if so, how?

Go all out with rogue. Take 4 fighter levels pre-epic for that fourth attack and then back to full roque at epics. Put everything you have into sneak attacks and watch enemies fold.

This goes exactly the same as you would build any other generic rogue, but with a different weapon. You could probably pull off using both a melee and a ranged weapon too if you are careful with the feats, but a melee weapon probably won't be necessary. You will just have to rely on corner sneaking or 6 SD levels to get those sneak attacks whenever you do not have a dedicated tank with you, and fighting undead or constructs will never happen. Going shadowdancer allows you to solo stuff, but that 6 levels hurts your sneak attack progression greatly.

EDIT: I made a rogue/fighter/SD like this once to get first hand experience about how ridiculously overpowered HIPS was before the long due nerf. The character soloed some Brogerdenstein areas at lvl 12 or something silly like that.

The Swede wrote:

The arcane archer already rolls around with 55+ Attack bonus. Lowering it a notch in favour of more damage should be prioritized.

With the kind of mad AC:s you see on amia, I'll take +1 ab over +3 damage. I can still change my opinion several times before hitting lvl 30 on Silwe, but thats the plan for now. Will be easy to drop AA to 17 and go for 2 more fighter levels in epics if I feel it is necessary.

Silvarus wrote:

The Swede wrote:

The arcane archer already rolls around with 55+ Attack bonus. Lowering it a notch in favour of more damage should be prioritized.

With the kind of mad AC:s you see on amia, I'll take +1 ab over +3 damage. I can still change my opinion several times before hitting lvl 30 on Silwe, but thats the plan for now. Will be easy to drop AA to 17 and go for 2 more fighter levels in epics if I feel it is necessary.

Here's my Edit on an Arcane Archer's Ab. I did a few errors .. it's apparently not 55+

Quote:

24 BAB + 14 DEX MOD = 38 + 5 GMW = 43 + EWF = 46 + 9 Arcane archer AB = 56 + Epic prowess = 57. (58 if you had 15 DEX Modifier) (59 If you had 19 Arcane Archer levels)

59 + d20 = 79 AC to become immune to an arcane archer's attacks.

:idea:

Good thing with archers is that they are easy to gear, too. Mighty caps at +5 which means you only need 20 STR. If you start with 14 that means you only need +4STR +2 from a potion to max it out.

The Official Teach a Man to Fish topic (Build topic):

Who is online