Today’s story has roots with one of my more crazy sessions in Dungeons and Dragons. I had an amazingly tanky Cleric of Paladine in Dragonlance who was challenged to a duel by the one and only Lord Soth. To start the battle, Soth threw his full force into attacking my character with as much unholy force as he could muster. After braving the attack my Cleric looked at him, cast Heal on himself (healing to full HP), and shrugged. At that moment, Lord Soth admitted defeat, as this was now a battle of attrition and he was without a means of healing.
Today, we’re going to use some feats (and a little help from the party Cleric) to make it so anyone can do the same.
First, we’re going to make some potions of Heal. Normally, you can only make potions up to the third spell level (That would be Cure Serious Wounds). We’ll have to fix that one with an additional feat- Improved Brew Potion.
The requirements are simple: You need to have Brew Potion and 8 ranks in Craft (Alchemy). This implies that you are level six to do this.
Improved Brew Potion now can be used to make a potion of any spell that has a Personal or Touch range. This includes Heal (Target gains +10 HP per caster level), a personal favorite. Your Cleric friend now can take their spare time and make the party nearly invincible.
Now, it wouldn’t be enough to have just nice potions. We need to do something to freak the opposition out and make them think the party’s full of demigods who can’t be phased by their puny weapons. I have just the thing, especially for the tank in the party- Delay Potion.
Delay Potion has the insanely low requirement of one rank in Knowledge (Arcana). For this, you can now drink a potion and the effect can be delayed for one hour for each point of their Constitution modifier.
What this means is a decent tank (16 Constitution) can drink a Heal Potion for lunch and “miraculously” heal their wounds mid-afternoon. You can only have one potion working on this feat at a time, logically, so it’s one shot to make your opponents believe you have regenerative powers. The question is what more do you need to send them running with tales of your prowess?
You can also do this with other utility potions. Haste and Spider Climb come to mind very easily. There’s a long list of appropriate Cleric and Wizard spells before we even talk about breaking the limit of the normal Brew Potion. There’s plenty of room for experiment, so feel free to go wild with this one.
Let’s try out an interesting combination. Today, we’ll make an Arcane Archer with the ability to use Bardic magic. This will be also using another class called the Battle Dancer, which can be found in the Dragon Magazine Compendium. Barring using a Wizard/Fighter with a load of feats and utility spells, this is the most I’ve found an archer able to do. Read on for my notes and build.
Race:
Our choice will be Elf this time. The Dex Bonus will be a help all around, and the Longbow proficiency will help us with a longer range and more damage.
Stats:
Dexterity and Charisma will be our focus. Constitution and Strength will be next for the pick, assuming that you may want a composite bow. Wisdom and Intelligence aren’t your biggest worry, unless the bard’s 6+int skillpoints isn’t enough for you.
Skills:
Arcane Archer requires no skills to go into. Because of this, you can take them in whatever you want. Tumble isn’t a bad idea, and knowledge skills can help you outside of battle. If you want to get the drop on your enemies, hide and move silently are always good choices.
Level 1: Battle Dancer 1
HP: 1d8 BAB: 1 Fort: 0 Ref: 2 Will: 0
Abilities: AC Bonus (Add Charisma to Armor Class), Unarmed Strike (Can attack with hands as a slashing weapon for 1d6 damage)
Feat: Weapon Focus (Longbow)- +1 on attack roles when using a Longbow
Level 2: Battle Dancer 2
HP: +1d8 BAB: 2 Fort: 0 Ref: 3 Will: 0
Abilities: Battle Dancer’s Performance (If Tumble is 5 or more, can give +4 to saves vs. Fear effects when in opponent’s threatened range)
Level 3: Battle Dancer 3
HP: 1d8 BAB: 3 Fort: 1 Ref: 3 Will: 3
Abilities: None
Feat: Point Blank Shot
Level 4: Bard 1
HP: 1d6 BAB: 3 Fort: 1 Ref: 5 Will: 2
Abilities: Bardic Music (Can use songs 1/day/bard level), Counter Song (Performance check can be used instead of any save vs. sound-based effect.), Fascinate (Performance vs. Will save for target to be stopped), Inspire Courage (+1 on Saving Throws against Fear, attack, and damage rolls), Bardic Knowledge (Any knowledge check can be made with Bard Level + Intelligence instead)
Stat: Dexterity +1
Level 5: Bard 2
HP: 1d6 BAB: 4 Fort: 1 Ref: 6 Will: 3
Abilities: None
Level 6: Bard 3
HP: 1d6 BAB: 5 Fort: 2 Ref: 6 Will: 3
Abilities: Inspire Competence (Use Bardic Music to add +2 to a skill check)
Feat: Point Blank Shot
Level 7: Bard 4
HP: 1d6 BAB: 6/1 Fort: 2 Ref: 7 Will: 4
Abilities: None
Level 8: Arcane Archer 1
HP: 1d8 BAB: 7/2 Fort: 4 Ref: 9 Will: 4
Abilities: Enhance Arrow +1 (All non-magic arrows you use gain a +1 Enchantment)
Stat: Dexterity +1
Level 9: Arcane Archer 2
HP: 1d8 BAB: 8/3 Fort: 5 Ref: 10 Will: 4
Abilities: Imbue Arrow (Spells can be cast with arrows. Range for spell becomes bow’s range)
Feat: Rapid Shot (Can take additional attack at full base attack, but all attacks that turn are with a -2 penalty to attack)
Level 10: Arcane Archer 3
HP: 1d8 BAB: 9/4 Fort: 5 Ref: 10 Will: 5
Abilities: Enhance Arrow +2 (All non-magic arrows you use gain a +2 enchantment)
Level 11: Arcane Archer 4
HP: 1d8 BAB: 10/5 Fort: 6 Ref: 11 Will: 5
Abilities: Seeker Arrow (1/day ignore cover when firing a single arrow)
Level 12: Arcane Archer 5
HP: 1d8 BAB: 11/6/1 Fort: 6 Ref: 11 Will: 5
Abilities: Enhance Arrow +3 (All non-magic arrows you use gain a +3 enchantment)
Feat: Manyshot (Full attack can be made with highest base attack, but all attacks are with a -4 Penalty)
Stat: Dexterity +1
Level 13: Arcane Archer 6
HP: 1d8 BAB: 12/7/2 Fort: 7 Ref: 12 Will: 5
Abilities: Phase Arrow (1/day a single arrow can ignore all non-magical barriers, including armor bonuses to AC)
Level 14: Arcane Archer 7
HP: 1d8 BAB: 13/8/3 Fort: 7 Ref: 12 Will: 5
Abilities: Enhance Arrow +4 (All non-magic arrows you use gain a +4 enchantment)
Level 15: Arcane Archer 8
HP: 1d8 BAB: 14/9/4 Fort: 8 Ref: 13 Will: 5
Abilities: Hail of Arrows (1/day shoot each target in range once at highest Base Attack as a standard action)
Feat: Weapon Specialization (+2 on damage rolls with Longbow)
Level 16: Arcane Archer 9
HP: 1d8 BAB: 15/10/5 Fort: 8 Ref: 13 Will: 6
Abilities: Enhance Arrow +5 (All non-magic arrows you use gain a +5 enchantment)
Stat: Dexterity +1
Level 17: Arcane Archer 10
HP: 1d8 BAB: 16/11/6/1 Fort: 9 Ref: 14 Will: 7
Abilities: Arrow of Death (Can use 1 day to create arrow. When used by this character only, opponent makes a fortitude save DC 20 or dies immediately. This ability cannot be used if this character possesses an Arrow of Death)
Feats: Manyshot’s effect changes (Full attack can be made at highest attack bonus, but with a -8 penalty to attack rolls)
Level 18: Bard 5
HP: 1d6 BAB: 16/11/6/1 Fort: 9 Ref: 14 Will: 7
Abilities: None
Feat: Greater Weapon Focus (+2 on Attacks with Longbow)
Level 19: Bard 6
HP: 1d6 BAB: 17/12/7/2 Fort: 10 Ref: 15 Will: 8
Abilities: Suggestion (10+bard level+Charisma vs. Will save to use suggestion spell on a fascinated opponent. This ability does not count as a use of Bardic Music)
Level 20: Bard 7
HP: 1d6 BAB: 18/13/8/3 Fort: 10 Ref: 15 Will: 7
Abilities: None
Stat: Dexterity +1
Notes:
This build is meant to use Charisma for both spellcasting and as a bonus to AC. With the Battle Dancer’s ability this character cannot wear armor, necessitating bracers of armor instead.
I should mention at this time that anytime a maximized character build it is a sheer coincidence. Many of these are un-playtested and are only built on a theme. If anyone bases a character off of my notes, feel free to tell me how you did with them.
Item ideas
-The character’s money should go into their bow. The bow should reach an effective +6 as soon as possible (+1 with a total of +5 in enchantments)
-Arrows should not be enchanted to fully use Arcane Archer’s skills. Instead, purchase Adamantine arrows in bulk, or any special metals you’d like. They will get enchantments soon enough for free.
-Charisma and Dexterity are vital- you do not want to get even the slightest scratch here. Gloves of Dexterity and Cloaks of Charisma are highly recommended to both increase AC and improve skills.
Improvements
-You may want to take a level in Bard as your first level. This will give you significantly more skill points. This order I presented is just organized based on Base Attack.
-For a more aggressive build, you can also go with Battle Dancer 6/Sorceror 1. This gives you more attack magic, a 1d8 unarmed attack that can count as a magic weapon when considering damage reduction, +10 land speed, and an additional modifier of +1 to your Armor Class. Of course, this is based on how much you want to be in melee range, which as an archer you shouldn’t.
The Arcane Archer is one of the primary archery prestige classes. This class can make shots that would otherwise be impossible in addition to enchanting any arrow that they see. The final ability, Arrow of Death, can kill all but the hardiest foe. All this with the attack and save progression of a Ranger makes this class an easy choice for ranged threats.
To handle a prestige class, you have to plan your character in advance. Each prestige class has requirements to enter, and Arcane Archer's has a few daunting ones. First of all, the class requires three feats: Point Blank Shot, Precise Shot, and Weapon Focus (Any Bow). On top of that, you need to be able to cast first-level spells and be an Elf or Half-Elf.
Without being able to get a free feat from being Human, you would have to use your feats that you get at 1st, 3rd, and 6th to make it into the class by level 7. Of course, you have plenty of time to worry about that while you're working on the required +6 Base Attack to qualify. When you have to take multiple classes, this can get to be a massive pain. So let's talk about how we can get there.
Spellcasting:
Duskblade
This is why you should consider this class. It gets the best Base Attack bonus and spellcasting, solving two of your problems at once. One level in this gets you on your way quickly, and you can take this at your leisure.
Elven Paragon
A strange kinda-class in Unearthed Arcana. Over three levels you gain 2 levels of Wizard spells, 2 Base Attack, and some little bonuses including 2 more Intelligence points. This would push the starting level for Arcane Archer by 1. Not a terrible choice if you're playing an Elf. The Half-Elf paragon requires you to previously take a level of spellcasting, and that takes too long.
Wizard/Sorcerer
These classes are what you were originally supposed to use with the class. They have glacial Base Attack Bonus. These two classes also don't have any interesting class abilities to make up for it as well. If you take this class, don't take any more than the one level. Anything else will just weigh you down.
Bard
Aside from Duskblade, Bard is the only class that can go into Arcane Archer without going into another class. This is pretty good if you feel like doing support in addition to attacking. Not a bad choice if you want to focus on the Arcane part, especially if you're playing a Half-Elf.
Getting your Base Attack up
Duskblade
More levels in Duskblade means more magic for you to use. You also still get your +1 Base Attack per level, which will keep you going.
Fighter
Prestige classes seem to be what Fighter exists for. The first two levels of Fighter give you two bonus feats, which lightens the load for the class requirements. Actually, and you'll hear this from me a lot, any melee prestige is made better by taking a pass through being a fighter.
Ranger/Paladin
The warriors of nature and the gods can add a little something to your repertoire. Choosing Ranger can give you some more breadth with your archery in addition to Favored Enemy. Paladins gain the ability to do some light healing and add Smite to your arsenal. Unlike the Ranger, however, you will not be able to advance in Paladin when you're tired of being an Arcane Archer. Also, you would need Charisma to fully use the Paladin's abilities.
Knight
Knights don't add to much this time outside of their Base Attack. If you really want that pony, by all means take a few levels. This time, and it pains to say it, you should probably go with Fighter instead.
Additional Ablilities
All of these classes come with the same cost: The lowest level you can enter Arcane Archer is level 8, assuming that you have 3 levels in Duskblade. The tradeoff is that you get some nice abilities in exchange.
Rogue/Scout
These classes go with casters with no trouble at all. With the Dexterity that you have as an archer, you have full use of their abilities. This also gives you the Sneak Attack and Skirmish abilities to use on your fancy arrows. Although you still can only do it once.
Cleric
Why settle on one kind of magic? With the addition of divine magic, you have a wider pool of abilities to draw on. Healing on the spot is always helpful, and you gain access to Turn Undead, an ability that can remove the most common problem you'll have as an archer. Mind you, you'll have to have a good Wisdom to use them. Just be sure to play nice with any other Clerics in the party.
Monk
As I said before, this gives you some survivability. Like the Cleric there is the whole Wisdom thing, and like the Paladin you can't go back. This time you also have to take the level in Duskblade to be able to use a bow.
Stats to Consider
Dexterity
This is how you hit people and not get hit yourself. You should put everything into this if you can help it.
Intelligence
You need at least 12 Intelligence to cast the first-level spells you picked up. You don't need much more to do your job, unless you picked up more magic. Still, it doesn't hurt to be well-read.
Strength
This is only important if you're using a Composite Bow. Otherwise, you can pass on this one.
Constitution
Getting hit is someone else's job. You have Hit Points just in case he drops.
Wisdom
Only needed if you've taken Cleric or Monk. Nice to use for Will saves, but a well-placed arrow solves Wizard problems just as well.
Charisma
You need this if your casting is from being a Bard or Sorcerer, but unless you're interested in using Paladin as well you can ignore this. Aside from that, who said anything about the person introducing the opposition to Sonic the Hedgehog cosplay in the most aggressive manner being friendly?
Talking about weapons is great, but they're only as good as the person using them. There are quite a few different classes that you can take for a choice of flavors for your bowman. That is what we'll be talking about today.
Oh, and for the record, we'll be skipping talking about races most of the time. This boils down to either A, choose a race with a good stat bonus for what you want to do (For this one it's Elf. They have +2 Dex and a free Longbow proficiency), or B, choosing Human for the bonus skill and feat. Of course a majority of you will most likely choose elf anyways, unless you're feeling contrary and want to screw the Tolkein rules.
Ranger
I've been talking about Ranger a lot. Rangers have the continuous Favored Enemy ability in addition to instantly learning the major archery feats through the class, leaving your feat purchases to go to other things. On top of that, there is the light magic they get to sweeten the deal. All this with a good Base Attack, High Skill Points, Reflex, and Fortitude leaves a well-rounded archer that while a little restricted choice for your archer. As I said before, this is very newbie friendly.
Fighter
Oh Fighter... All you did was try to be the jock class in a nerd game, and you and your white straight male example are made the butt of every joke ever. This time, however, there is something to be gained. You see, there is a daunting amount of feats that can be used to make an archer skilled in combat, and the Fighter is possibly the only one that can snag most of them. With a free feat every other level, the fighter can tack on extra damage, gain bonuses to hit, and keep snatching the major feats as they come. Fighters are slower than most other classes, missing the spells, extra abilities, and reflex saves that the other classes we're mentioning today share, but it does have a high HP total and good Base Attack, making sure that you can hit and survive being hit. You however may want to just take a level or two of this.
Bard
Bard is the all around class, so of course they can do archery. Specifically, they can use the Shortbow to do their attacks. They have good reflex and will as opposed to the Ranger, and has a middle-of-the-road Base Attack. They're also squishy, so you might want to keep some arrows on you anyways. Their spellcasting also gives them an edge on enemies with surprise effects. So while you're doing everything else, why not shoot at people?
Rogue
Rogues aren't the first thing you'd think of when you're talking about ranged attacks, normally being more fond of tickling people's internal organs with a dagger. That is assuming that you haven't seen what it does in Skyrim. To make a ranged Rogue, you need to invest some money into magic items you may not normally need, but getting off that extra damage makes it worthwhile. Like Ranger, there is a wide variety of skills to choose from, giving you more things to do outside of combat as well as options during it. You may trade off some archery feats to get some buffs to your sneak attack as well. Sadly Rogues don't have the best attack, so you may need to invest a lot into your Dexterity (which you should be doing anyway).
Scout
Scout is a more archery-focused Rogue. Instead of Sneak Attack, they gain an ability called Skirmish. So long as they move at lease 10 feet during their turn, they gain a bonus to their damage and Armor Class based on their Scout level. With a high Dexterity, this makes for a hard target. The run and gun style may have some bonuses, but you can only get off one arrow each round. This is because to use the Scouts abilities, you have to break the rule that would allow you your full attack. This is a fun one if you want to get your DM good and mad about your invincibility.
It should be noted, there is a Feat that allows you to stack Rogue and Scout levels for both Sneak Attack and Skirmish. You can only use one of those abilities at a time. Sorry, no mountain of d6's this time.
Knight
And now we talk about things that you may not have even considered using. The knight by most accounts should be used to charge at people with a lance on horseback crying challenges against other noble families. Knights however are some of the best horsemen in the game. Historically, mounted archery is one of the most fearsome battle strategies, responsible for the rise of Ghengis Kahn and the myth of the Centaur. The knight's class abilities give you interesting things to do in battle, but you do have to use your feats to use a bow properly. Like the Fighter, the knight has good HP and attack, but trades their fortitude with will (which is nice against magic-using enemies). This isn't the most optimized build, but that's the price you pay for an interesting character.
Duskblade
...Duskblade... Dusk Blade... You must think I'm playing a trick on you this time. The primary focus of this class is to use magic while you're hitting things with your sword. The benefit we're looking for here is the spell casting, of course. This class in general is like the fighter, but with better abilities. The addition of touch spells give you a nasty response to anyone invading your personal space, and the only stat change from fighter is that the Will save improves. Once again, you have to dedicate your feats to archery, and you need some Intelligence to use magic, but there is a payoff. We'll talk about that in the next post.
Monk
This class has the harshest limits on weapons. You're down to Crossbow and slings to do your work, but you have a nice tradeoff. Monks are some of the biggest tanks you can get. They have a special ability that adds their Wisdom to their Armor Class as well as their Dexterity. This class was roughed up a little with 3.5, but with some thought, there is plenty of room to work with.
When you're talking about specific weapons, there's normally one or two classes that stick out. However, taking a look at some non-standard builds can help make your character stand out from the crowd.
Let’s talk a little more about ranged combat, this time we’ll go over some equipment for you to consider when adventuring. We’ll be talking about “normal” fantasy weapons this time, while I do have some fun stories about playing a cowboy Ranger with a shotgun.
Shortbow/Longbow
The bread and butter of the fantasy world. These two bows were so venerated that showing the ability to still fire one became the most common explicit hand symbol. The shortbow has a reach of 60 feet and a damage of 1d6, while the longbow has a reach of 100 feet and deals 1d8 damage. The longbow, of course, costs more than twice than it’s brother to make up for this.
Due to it’s prevalence in stories from Robin Hood to Aragorn, Dungeons and Dragons uses these weapons as the benchmark for archery, and every feat is assumes that you are using one of these.
Composite Shortbow/Longbow
The composite bows are made from a detailed process of treating and straining the wood into a unique shape to give more force behind the assault. Dearly more expensive than the mundane counterparts, these bows require strength to use, and can backfire if you don’t match their resistance. The payoff, however, is that you add your strength score based on the bow to attack and damage. This is the only way to add damage to a bow without using enchantments or class abilities.
Crossbow
The crossbow was invented so ranged artillery didn’t have to be only trained experts. Like it’s child, the gun, any idiot can use it with decent results. The problem with them is the crossbow is... Kinda lame. This light crossbow is on par with the longbow, the hand crossbow is easy to conceal with a meager 1d4 damage, and the heavy crossbow does a healthy 1d10 damage, but they all have a loading time. The hand and light versions require a move action, and after you shoot a heavy, it’ll be another turn before you use it again. You can buy repeating versions at great cost, but that only makes it so you can shoot it five times before losing your next turn. This isn’t a weapon for the experienced archer, it’s the backup plan for the wizard. You sadly can’t use Manyshot with these, but on the bright side they do benefit from dual wielding feats.
Sling
I’m growing fonder and fonder of this little thing, next time I roll up a character I might make a Ranger who specializes in this. A sling, of course, is a strap of leather or cloth that you use to throw stones at people using the power of centripetal motion. This weapon doesn’t stack up well with the others, only giving you 1d4 damage, but you’re never going to be out of ammo. The ey points on this are the low selling point of “just take one” and the fact you can add your strength to the damage as a Composite bow. It makes a little sense, considering that you are just doing advanced throwing. The sling is also a prehistoric weapon, so if you have a troublesome DM that worries about appropriate tech levels, this weapon is always in style.
Blowgun
A more exotic choice primarily for people you aren’t fond of making a mess. These have a weak range of 10 feet and deal only 1 point of damage an attack. It is, however, not meant to do direct damage. You use this either to have it poisoned, use your sneak attack bonus (The slight of hand to hide something tiny like a blowgun dart is childsplay), or for the advanced assassin both. You can also refluff these as throwing darts if you feel like just playing Stezer Gabbini from Final Fantasy VI.
With ranged weapons, damage is not the largest concern. As I posted earlier, there are plenty of ways to lump more damage onto these weapons to the point that 1d4 isn’t too different from 1d10. What’s important is how the weapon moves and how you want your character to play. When in doubt use a (Composite) longbow, but don’t feel like you have to play only a single way. If you’re not hung up on “the best” way to do something, you can easily find something that is a lot of fun and still works.
Okay, I need to think about something to get the latest X-Men out of my mind, so we’re talking about this old thing. A controversial little thing based solely on the divide between female gamers and the “true gamer” types. Now, there’s a long history to this that I don’t feel like talking about, so instead we’ll talk about the punchline: Can you have your favored enemy be “The Patriarchy”?
The short answer is yes. The long answer is after the page break
Let’s talk about Favored enemy as a starting point. Favored Enemy is a special skill for the Ranger class that is taken on the first level and every level that’s a multiple of five after that. Each time, you choose a type of monster (Goblinoid, Orc, Dragon, and Ooze for example) and you get a +2 bonus to Bluff, Listen, Sense Motive, Search, and Survival in addition to +2 damage when attacking them. If that isn’t sweet enough, each time a ranger gets an additional +2 bonus to a Favored Enemy (So at Level five, you have one Favored Enemy at +2 and one at +4). If that isn’t enough for you, there’s a bevy of feats that grants you everything from additional damage to your targets to adding the bonus to attack rolls (As if you didn’t hate The Man enough already).
Now, speaking of feats, I want to talk about Dallas’s build. There is one nasty feat for Assassin that you can pick up that makes a thief/ranger like her awesome- but not oneshot three men at one sadly. It turns the Assassin spells into Ranger spells and builds on the Ranger spell progression. The second thing, and this is the important part, is that Favored Enemy now is included into the Assassin’s Death Attack. Death Attack can ruin someone’s day, and if there’s a certain noble who’s been harassing his maids... Well, he better roll well.
You may have caught on that the only way so far to accomplish the war against the Patriarchy is to take Humanoid (Human) as your choice. This is because there are two popular variations in separate books. Unearthed Arcana introduces the concept of a Favored Environment (Such as Plains, Forest, Dungeon), which is a personal favorite. My ideal Tomb of Horror DPS is built around Favored Environment Dungeon. The other is found in the Dragon Magazine Compendium under a variant class called the Urban Ranger.
Long story short, it’s Ranger for cities. They get city based companions, city based magic, and hatred of organizations. Specifically they can choose certain groups such as Churches, guilds, or political parties and get their bonus there. This has its benefits if, for example, you’re going after the Dark Brotherhood in Skyrim. Favored Enemy: Dark Brotherhood gives you the bonus against all of them instead of having to take Favored Enemy: Humanoid (Human), Undead, and Lycanthrope. This is where you can have your anti-Patriarchy come into play.
The sad thing is that these bonuses do not stack. Remember that Red Dragon Ghost? If you have Favored Enemy: Undead +2 and Favored Enemy: Dragon +4, you only get the +4. So even if your DM let you take Favored Enemy: Goblinoid, Favored Environment: Forest, and Favored Enemy: The Patriarchy, you can only get a +6 if you focused your bonus points into one Favored, even if you’re in the woods and that goblin did make one too many damned sandwich jokes.
The most important thing, and why many people don’t enjoy playing Ranger, is that there needs to be some agreement between the Ranger and the DM. The DM needs to explain what the Ranger may be facing commonly so the Ranger can stat up appropriately. Those Patriarchy bonuses are not going to be useful if you’re just going to fight Amazons all day. Oh, and also try your best to not take Favored Enemy traits that describe your party members. That just makes it hard on everyone.
As for fighting The Patriarchy, go for it. This is what D&D exists for, a healthy outlet for what’s troubling for you. In addition, an established social structure that is against your favor is an amazing way to build up your character. I mean, it was done before with Drizz’t. Just be sure any guys you’re playing with are okay with it, but honestly you shouldn’t be playing with anyone who takes fighting Judge Frolo as a personal affront.
I think about magic items a lot. Ever since I introduced the idea that instead of taking whatever was available in dungeons or having to barter with wizards and their dubious grasp on reality that we could make our shinies ourselves for a fraction of the price, everyone has been looking into making their own. That said players with absolute control over their power levels is a dangerous thing, and one common problem we have is arrow abuse.
For those who don’t know, there are special rules for making ammunition. As it is a disposable resource, the normal item costs are spread over fifty of the same arrows. This can be abused to make an effective +10 arrow (a normal cost of 200,000 GP) cost a mere 4,000 GP. This drops even further to 2,000 if you made it yourself, or an absurd 400 GP if you have a fully specced Artificer from the Eberron setting.
Today I’ll be explaining how enchanting bows and arrows works, some limitations on them, and how you can make the system work for you. For DMs, we’ll talk about how you can stop your players from abusing loopholes and punching a hole through your Lich endboss.
First, I am assuming that you know what a bow is. It’s one of the most basic weapons that can be found in most all societies. While I will be speaking in bows and arrows, this can apply to any ranged weapon you’d like from slings to machine guns. To craft magical ammunition, you’ll need an appropriate craft skill (Fletching for arrows and crossbow bolts, stone/metalworking for slings bullets, gunsmithing for firearm bullets, ect), and the feat Craft Magical Arms and Armor. Spellcraft is important as well to make sure the spell takes, and of course knowledge of the spell helps. These do not have to be on the same person by the way. You can have a dumb as a brick Fighter that’s only good at carving arrows working with the party Druid to make them prime for hunting if you’d like.
The largest bonus to this is that certain things stack, as you can enchant both the weapon and the ammunition. While enhancement bonuses do not stack (a +2 arrow shot from a +1 bow has an effective modifier of +2, not +3), any specific enchantments do. One such experiment is fighting the ghost of an adult red dragon. Our bow for this will be a +5 Holy Axiomatic Ghosttouch Longbow, and the arrow will be a +1 Bane Dragon Bane Undead Magebane Cold Sonic arrow. We will just ignore that equipment totaling 201,440 is overkill in the first place. The damage for that goes as such:
1d8+5 (Base Damage for bow and enhancement bonus) +2 (Holy bonus to damage) +2 (Axiomatic bonus to damage) +2 (Dragonbane bonus to damage) +2 (Undeadbane bonus to damage) +2 (Magebane bonus to damage) + 2d6 (Holy bonus to dice) +2d6 (Axiomatic bonus to dice) +2d6 (Dragonbane bonus to dice) + 2d6 (Undeadbane bonus to dice) +2d6 (Magebane bonus to dice) +2x1d6 (Cold Damage, doubled for weakness) +1d6 (Sonic Damage)
This simplifies to 1d8+15 +11d6 +1d6x2. Assuming the d8 lands in the ballpark of 4.5 and the d6 at 3.5, that’s 19.5+45.5=65 points of damage. An adult red dragon has 253 HP, and you just knocked a fifth of his health off with just a “hello”. The worst part is, assuming that you’re at least level ten, that isn’t your only attack that round. Thankfully for the poor bastard he’s immune to crits, or you could obliterate him before he knew what was going on. Then again he would have five melee attacks a round and dish out large amounts of HP and stat damage, so he really deserves it.
What you can learn from this as a DM is clearly not to make monsters that have multiple glaring weak points. You should also spread around creature types a little to make it so your archer isn’t blowing through everything (of course, you shouldn’t do too much. You want to antagonize the character, not the player).
The balance here is that the ammunition is consumable. Arrow shafts break, and the arrow heads get buried inside the monster alongside and bullets and bolts that were shot off during the battle. The Dungeon Masters Guide notes that these are gone forever. On the other side of the spectrum, my group have implemented that adamantium arrows don’t break and can be retrieved without trouble. I personally disagree with both of these (I just don’t bring up the houserule since there is noting to gain from gimping other party members because I’m the only one who reads the rulebooks in detail.) I prefer the chance to recover them with some difficulty. DC10+the Challenge Rating of the target versus the player’s search or survival seems fair. Of course, you can run your game however you like.
Now, how do we make the bow work for you? This is a simple matter of choosing what you want to enchant. The general rule is that what you want to be constant goes on your bow, and what you need at the moment is on the arrow. The bow should be the priority for enhancement bonuses as well, so you can keep the cost of arrows down as well.
Suggested bow enchantments are things vital to the campaign. If you’re playing Ravenloft for example, you want things such as Holy and Undeadbane. If you’re going to be facing dragons, you’ll need Dragonbane. I’m personally fond of adding the Force enchantment, which is like a Ghost Touch that ignores all damage reduction. I’d also advise Keen here to improve the critical if you don’t feel like taking the Improved Critical feat.
Ammunition is where you set everything that you’d like to be ready for, but aren’t going to use every day. Bane and elemental arrows are nice here, and so are expensive enchantments like Vorpal (Decapitates on critical). As with my example, keep the enhancement to +1 here. You’ll need these to be as cheap as possible.
There are a lot of various exploits in archery for D&D, and there is only one way to be sure everything fits together. If you’re going to be an archer, you should talk with your DM about what his expectations are. Finding out early it’s cool if you have just one adamantium arrow of returning for your Ranger or if you have to pick up full batches of 50 arrows will greatly improve your enjoyment and effectiveness in the game. With all this knowledge in hand, you should be able to snipe any problem before it gets out of hand.
A while ago, my group introduced some new friends into a long campaign called “Shackled City”. The soon to be married couple were inexperienced and were excited to join in with us. The husband-to-be immediately went for complicated builds while the bride-to-be wanted something to match her personality- a paladin. The husband over time took charge of doing the changes to her character sheet (she was notoriously bad at math), and helped her choose prestige classes. After the game ended the bride-to-be and I talked about how she felt about playing, and the major thing she mentioned was that the prestige class over-complicated things for her. With that in mind, we then began talking about starting characters for the inexperienced.
I need to preface this with the fact that I started with OD&D, whose starter sets had prescribed characters for you to use, so I had more time to learn the game before having to build the characters. Of course, my time in 2nd edition was embarassing things like a Moogle (Homebrew) Bard/Ninja and leveled out to a Silver Dragon Paladin of Honor. 3.X is a lot more modular in its build, so there is no ready character unless you want to play something out of the NPC tables in the Dungeon Master’s Guide (really not suggested). Before I start my repertoire of Characters, we should go what I think are the best to worst choices for a new player.
-These are, of course, my opinion only. Feel free to reply with your own opinions if you disagree.
Best Starting Classes
My definition for the best class to start with is something that can do multiple things well, while not relying on everything at once to succeed. They also have traits that can make it easier for the player to be involved with the campaign.
Bard
-The Bard is a nice mix of Melee and magic that can do almost anything. Their main role is to support the team through their Bardic Music ability and spells that focus on buffing the party and disabling the enemy. They also have healing magic to boot! If things go bad, they have an okay base attack to defend themselves with. The best thing to add to this is a bard-specific weapon, the Crystal Echo Blade, which allows them to fight even better while singing.
Ranger
-Being Aragorn was one the the original reasons D&D was made. The Ranger gets a small taste of the Druid spell list alongside two trees (no pun intended) that allow for a free mastery of two fancy fighting styles. Free feats and magic together are like chocolate and peanut butter, and having good skills, saves, and base attack is just overkill. I’d personally suggest this over anything else to a new character. It’s a sampler box of everything the game has to offer.
Paladin
-Paladins are a popular punching bag because of their limiting oath as listed in the Player’s Handbook and their general no fun allowed attitude. Paladins are a great choice if you want to wrap yourself up in armor and hit things really hard. They’re not too smart or skilled, but they still can muster some healing on the spot for you. The major allure of the class, however, is that a Paladin is a station. You have an order that you belong to and a reputation built into the class. This allows you and the DM to keep a story for your character going, and you always have a reason for your character to be adventuring. With that support system, you have people who are always willing to talk with you when you enter town and drop you that next lead. The best, of course, is if a more experienced player is a Cleric in the same order for some buddy cop action.
Focused Fighters
Characters in these classes are a little more advanced than the last few. You can still use them, but it may take more effort. They also have a lot to ask for with skill points, so you might be bored outside of battle.
Barbarian
-This class was custom-made so people could play Conan. These berserkers have little skill with armor, little skills and saves, and even have to dedicate skill points to being able to read. They however do hit like a truck with their Rage ability. Honestly, I’m not a fan of this class. That doesn’t mean that you can’t get some mileage out of being a dumb brute or noble savage yourself.
Monk
-This class gets a lot of complaints. It exists so people can play Kung-Fu characters, and isn’t even in the theme of the other characters. Monks also need to be more well-rounded than other classes to use all of their abilities. While a Paladin can eschew wisdom and survive on Strength and Charisma, Monks need Strength, Dexterity and Wisdom at a minimum. However, their abilities are constant and have good defenses. They also don’t need a lot of equipment normally, so they are very low-maintenance at low levels while you’re growing into them. I’d personally rebrand them as “Boxer” or “Pugilist” and take out the discipline focus myself.
Too Many Choices
Complicated classed can confound careless constituents. When you’re starting out figuring how to hit a goblin with your sword can be daunting enough, let alone detailing maneuvers and sifting through a dozen possible actions. These classes may be better left off to more experienced players.
Cleric
-Healers are always needed. Clerics are given a wide spell pool, a decent amount of skills, base attack equal to a Bard or Monk, and can be customized through worshiping the right god. With the ability to choose a new set of spells each morning without restriction you can go from healing one day to buffing the next to summoning angels to fight for you the next day. This is, of course, a lot of management. Also, having to focus on healing can get dull after a while.
Druid
-There is a term that is thrown around called a CoDzilla. The general idea is that a well done Cleric or Druid is virtually unstoppable. There is a heavy emphasis on Druid. Druids have the unique ability to turn into animals at will, gaining their physical traits and keeping their mental abilities, even their spell casting with the right feats. With the right preparation, you can do practically anything. You can heal, throw fireballs, track your enemies, and if that fails turn into a grizzly bear and eat the jerks. Druid however lacks the flexibility of a Cleric with magic, and can easily be built in a way that is redundant to at least one other player. This is something that you should talk with your group first, so you can agree to what you’ll be doing during the campaign.
Rogue
-Whether you’re being Bilbo Baggins or Ezio Auditore, there’s always a demand for a sneaky bastard. Rogues can take unfair advantages to deal massive amounts of damage, and can easily put all of their points into Dexterity and serve them quite well. They also gain the largest amount of skills out of the basic classes, matching the wizard. The problem is, however, that their attacks take an extra step to assure that they can deal their extra damage. In addition, certain creatures such as undead and bugs can’t take that damage, leaving the poor Rogue to sit the fight out.
Wizard
-Who doesn’t want to be Gandalf? Wizards are the superstars of the magic world, having a large pool of spells, and the ability to have them all on their Character Sheet without worrying about silly things like morals and other people’s feelings. However, a Wizard can easily spend hours deciding what spells they want to prepare over the day. Unless you have a really strong grip on what your character can do, you can easily drag your game to a crawl. Mind you, losing friends over a game is a pain, if we wanted that we’d be playing Risk.
All Sizzle...
Sorceror
-Sorceror is essentially a Wizard who went to a party college. Relying on heritage they don’t feel the need to study magic leading to more energy to cast spells, but a limited knowledge of them. They also get no abilities outside their spells to balance them out. This is one that you play if you have a definite game plan, usually involving dragons.
Not Even Once
Fighter
-Fighter is the unwanted child of the base classes. Wizards of the Coast demanded that the art for the game show the fighter as an attractive white male and obvious leader of the group, and the artists took the piss out of him the entire run. Fighters have great health and attack, but they are weak to almost everything. The assumed benefit is that they get ten additional feats over their career, but none of them really make up for the special class abilities or spells of the other classes. Later books introduced other classes which are objectively better than them, which I may review in the future. This class is best if you need a load of feats to do a specific build in a quick time, but trust me that your time will be better spent as a Ranger or Paladin.
Dishonorable Mention
Generic Warrior, Expert, Spellcaster
-Actually in the Unearthed Arcana suppliment, these three classes are very deceptive. They present a class equivalent to a Build a Bear Workshop, allowing to make your own character your way. In practice, these characters really aren’t any better than the base classes. However, there is something to say about taking the Warrior class, putting all ten bonus traits into Favored Enemy, and adding a +20 to every roll against one type of creature. Actually, I need to correct myself. Use the Generic Warrior before using Fighter. Go powerbomb some dragons.
Hello, all. You can call me Da’ac. I am starting this blog with the intention of discussing various gaming topics, but primarily Dungeons and Dragons 3.X.
Of course, there are plenty of other things to talk about. I consider myself a rather well-rounded geek, and can talk about everything from Shounen Fightin’ Anime to classic Sci-Fi to Technicolor horses.
This of course mixes. So if you had this thought, such as wanting to play as a certain gem-based alien or popular Disney character, but didn’t know how to swing it, I can certainly help figure things out. I might even be able to help out with different systems- just talk with your GM about any fluff changes I note.
Oh, and any build I post here will be on a practical basis. There are plenty of forums that will show you how to gestalt between several classes to make a character that is unbelievably powerful with the right equipment and just a little tweaking of the rules. My intention is to have something that is simple, sweet, and usable at even entry level. Builds will be presented level by level with appropriate changes for if you wanted to start at a certain power level. Mind you, many characters are level 20 at the start of their applicable series, so they might not be as powerful as you like.
That said, I hope that you can use or at least be entertained with what I have to present, and enjoy my ramblings... Which I am apt to do, considering how long this mess is.
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