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Post by DancingOwlbear on Jan 16, 2015 9:22:20 GMT
I will readily admit that, when it comes to D&D, my experience with 3.5 is limited. I briefly played a few sessions of Living Greyhawk at a convention when I was a wee lad. Most of my d20-related gaming occurs with Pathfinder and, most recently, D&D 5th. I know how to make a character, but that isn't what the problem is. It's the options! Do I make a Fighter? Do I make a Swordsage? Do I make a Duskblade/Hexblade/Red Dragon Disciple/Drunken Master with a half-dragon template?! There's so many classes and so many feats, I'm paralyzed by the variety of choices available to me. And that's not even including all the possible homebrew that might be allowed. Specifically, I'm wanting to make a Halfling character that focuses on melee combat. Preferably of the more disciplined variety rather than something like a Barbarian. I'm somewhat drowsy at the moment so I apologize if my post is confusing in any way. I'm just having trouble narrowing down my options to a more reasonable list.
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Post by Gaiyamato on Jan 16, 2015 10:34:56 GMT
Welcome to the bane of all 3.5 players. I would say if you want a halfling fighter, check out Tome of Battle. Swordsage Halflings can be badass. A Swordsage/Swashbuckler Lightfoot Halfling can become a machine. Also have a look at the Halfling specific stuff in Races of the Wild. Personally I think that Halflings with the Sandstorm exotic weapons are awesome as well. Two weapon fighting with Thrombashes is pretty cool as well. Take Halfling 3/Swashbuckler 1/Swordsage 2 and specialise in throwing Thrombashes of returning +1!! High DEX + high WIS gives you DEX+WIS to AC, DEX to attack rolls in melee and DEX+WIS to Initiative using the feat Yondallah's Sense. Use Sneak attack trickery to increase your damage instead of worrying about strength.
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Post by Gaiyamato on Jan 16, 2015 10:42:41 GMT
Actually Rogue 3/Swashbuckler 2 taking the Daring Outlaw feat from Complete Scoundrel book can help as well. Stacks Rogue and Swashbuckler levels for Sneak attack and Grace Bonus and Dodge Bonus.
I am sure we could brew up one for stacking Swordsage and Rogue as well. Give you all those tasty bonuses while keeping a good SA and Melee ability.
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Post by Cendar on Jan 16, 2015 13:08:01 GMT
For disciplined melee, you definitely want Tome of Battle classes. Warblade and Crusaders are the more disciplined of the martial classes (warblade being the disciplined fighter fix, and crusader being the disciplined Paladin fix). But Swordsage would work for that concept as well.
The beauty of 3.5e, though, is that you can create any character concept multiple ways.
Oh, one other thing - fluff is just fluff, and can be altered to suit your character's needs, so long as the fluff still fits the crunch.
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Post by DancingOwlbear on Jan 16, 2015 22:57:42 GMT
I was looking at the homebrew stuff and, wow, Grod's Fighter is fantastic! But is it possible to make an effective strength-based halfling fighter?
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Post by Gaiyamato on Jan 17, 2015 0:02:37 GMT
Sure, you can get to 17 strength right off the bat for a halfling fighter. With good dex as well and the ability to get high initiative they can be effective.
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Nick
New Member
Posts: 13
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Post by Nick on Mar 6, 2015 19:53:37 GMT
Option 1: The fighter/swashbuckler If you have a high intelligence, you can go with a Fighter 2/Swashbuckler 3, specifically in this order: (Swashbuckler, Fighter, Swashbuckler, Fighter, Swashbuckler). Use the Cityscape Fighter variant to switch Ride for Tumble in your fighter's class skill list to ensure max ranks in tumble. That's 5 feats (one of them being Weapon Finesse), a ridiculous fortitude save, and able to add your intelligence bonus to damage rolls. With that build, you'd have to worry about dexterity, constitution, and intelligence. If you can play the point game well and not let Charisma suffer, then you can be an effective party face AND a compatible melee damager, while still keeping things relatively simple on your part. To top all your mobility-like options off, you're getting 10+4d10+(5 x con mod) hit points, making you pretty tanky! The tanky tumbler! Option 2: From Rags to Rabbi This build requires 1 level of Battle Dancer, a class from Dragon Magazine, followed by four levels of Monk, Swordsage, or two 2-level dips with Ninja and Fighter. The lore for the battle dancer is about living life under cruelty and tyranny, and secretly training to overcome your masters. With one level of the class, you were able to escape, and then joined a monastery away from civilization to improve so you can one day go back to your captors to free all of your friends you had to leave behind.
1: Battle Dancer- From one level of this class, you get a +1 BAB and +2 to reflex saves, in addition to 1d6 unarmed damage and adding your charisma bonus to your AC. You'd also gain Improved Unarmed Strike as a bonus feat (duh). Class skills are Balance, Climb, Escape Artist, Hide, Jump, Listen, Move Silently, Open Lock, Perform, Sleight of Hand, Swim, and Tumble. 4+int skill points. (Dragon Magazine Compendium, pages 19-29)
2-5: You'd have to change your alignment to Lawful from Chaotic to take Monk, but from what I understand what the Battle Dancer is supposed to be (a chaotic-ish version of the monk), and how an "ex-monk" doesn't lose class features, I think you'd still be able to add your Charisma bonus to AC in addition to your Wisdom bonus. In my opinion, Swordsage would be better than monk, since it would give you a lot more versatility. Also, if you can find someone to make a swordsage character to be your "master" or "sensei" or "rabbi" or whatever, you can have a fun roleplaying partner in a lot of adventures.
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