ToB:Bo9S Tank / City Watch Character Build

Mistwell · Sep 19, 2007

blargney the second said:
Yep, that's right.

Wow, yeah, that is a potent combination. Before I thought it through I was thinking you would use Stone Power whenever you could and just hope that was the round you took the damage, but now I see that the Crusader knows when to use the feat - after they are hit.

And since there are DR-granting maneuvers in the Stone Dragon discipline, it wouldn't be hard to use Stone Power to prevent lots of damage in round 1, and then the very maneuver you used to trigger that feat to prevent damage through DR in round 2. I can see how a Crusader with just a couple of Stone Dragon maneuvers can soak up damage fairly often with this feat.

Zurai · Sep 19, 2007

Just remember that you cannot use Stone Dragon maneuvers unless you are touching the ground. Shouldn't be too much issue for your character quite yet, but a note to remember for the future.

Nifft · Sep 19, 2007

Mistwell said:
I can see how a Crusader with just a couple of Stone Dragon maneuvers can soak up damage fairly often with this feat.

Bingo!

You hear people talking about Crusaders soaking up 3 to 4 times their maximum HP in prolonged battles. Scary.

But also the Crusader can outright heal himself with Divine Spirit strikes. They're like frikkin' Energizer(tm) bunnies... :uhoh:

Cheers, -- N

brehobit · Sep 19, 2007

Some important build/play things for crusaders

Notice that at 1st level you basically have 6 choices for manouvers (7?) and get 5. So you _will_ have some of every school.
Notice that stances count as manouvers for purposes of meeting prereqs. This is extremely helpful and pretty much means crusaders can generally not worry about prereqs
Don't forget about the ability to swap out manouvers at even levels (other than 2). That doubles the number of "high level" manouvers you have.
Extra granted maneuver is not only handy because of having more choices, it causes the refresh to happen 1 round sooner, letting you cycle faster.
The 2nd level manouvers that let you do +2d6 damage and ignore DR are hugely powerful at lower levels. +7 damage is gross, and the +5 vs. some things you effectively get for ignoring DR (skeletons, zombies, etc.) is sweet. One you hit 3rd level, a sword-and-board crusader should be doing more damage than a non-raging barbarian or fighter using a two-handed weapon.
The heal 2 points stance is worse than you might first think (but still might be worth taking). Why?
- With Stone Power you might miss a lot.
- With strikes you are likely only taking one attack per round even at level 6+
- There is a higher level stance which is strictly better (4 points to you and an ally either time either one of you hit) and you can't swap out stances, so it becomes 100% useless.
PrCs are less strong than they first appear because you can't swap out manouvers at even levels.
I like the feat that let's you heal 3+ level hit points when you recover manouvers. Combined with extra readied action, you heal 3+level hit points at at the start of round 4 of every fight. Not bad. Not clearly better than improved toughness (unless your party lacks wands of healing) but handy. Certainly handy.
If you don't use cards to represent readied manouvers everyone at the table will hate you because you will slow down the game so much. I strongly recommend the ones on Wizard's site.

Vysirez · Sep 21, 2007

One other thing to keep in mind for crusader builds is the number of strikes you take. If you take extra granted maneuver, which i recommend, your maneuvers will refresh every 3 rounds. So it will be difficult to use more then 3 strikes before they all refresh. So it's good to keep that in mind when you pick and replace maneuvers. It's hard at low levels, but you often want to take a fair number of boosts and counters.

While I do agree that crusaders make better tanks, and I think they can still go pretty good damage, you can still do a tankish warblade as well. Just depends on if you want to focus more on offense or defense. Though if your set on sword and board I think a crusader is a better choice. But if not, a warblade using a 2H weapon can be pretty nice. You still get d12 HD and can pick up some ok defensive maneuvers in Diamond mind.

Mistwell · Sep 21, 2007

While looking at how a first level Crusader gets put together, I was surprised to find that they get every single maneuver available to them except one (5 selections out of 6 choices), and two of them are actually identical maneuver's from different disciplines! Not only that, but I guess you get that 6th choice at second level as well (I'd have to check the book). I sure wish they would come out with more maneuvers, even as just a web update!

Nifft · Sep 21, 2007

Mistwell said:
Not only that, but I guess you get that 6th choice at second level as well (I'd have to check the book). I sure wish they would come out with more maneuvers, even as just a web update!

Yep yep yep. 4th level is when you get to start dropping those 1st level maneuvers which you didn't really want in the first place. You continue doing this every even level until ... well, for quite a while.

Cheers, -- N

ToB:Bo9S Tank / City Watch Character Build

Mistwell

Crusty Old Meatwad (he/him)

Zurai

First Post

Nifft

Penguin Herder

brehobit

Explorer

Vysirez

First Post

Mistwell

Crusty Old Meatwad (he/him)

Nifft

Penguin Herder

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