Mage-Brute build help

Nifft · Apr 15, 2008

I'd go Barbarian 1 / Battle Sorcerer 6 / Abjurant Champion 5 and then whatever after that. Race could be Human... there's nothing wrong with Humans. The extra feat is nice.

A slightly more complex build would be Barbarian 1 / Battle Sorcerer 4 / Human Paragon 3 / Abjurant Champion 5.

Battle Caster feat? Don't bother. Just wear Light armor and enjoy your fast movement.

You may want to look into the Infernal Sorcerer [Heritage] feats to turn your spell-slots into a sonic howl attack, or into the Draconic [Heritage] feats to turn your spell-slots into other stuff.

Cheers, -- N

pawsplay · Apr 15, 2008

What about a Warlock? With the blast shape invocation Hideous Blow they channel their eldritch blast through a weapon.

This will never work. Hideous blow is an invocation that allows you to take an eldritch spear, reduce its range to melee, and turn a touch attack into a regular attack, all to add the weapon's base damage. Further, using it (in melee!) results in an attack of opportunity.

Drowbane · Apr 15, 2008

Warlock with an aesthetically reimagined "Eldritch Glaive" might work.

Its too bad you're not allowed Psionics. A wilder / illithid slayer could fit the bill very nicely.

Derro · Apr 15, 2008

pawsplay said:
What about a Warlock? With the blast shape invocation Hideous Blow they channel their eldritch blast through a weapon.

This will never work. Hideous blow is an invocation that allows you to take an eldritch spear, reduce its range to melee, and turn a touch attack into a regular attack, all to add the weapon's base damage. Further, using it (in melee!) results in an attack of opportunity.

I believe you are mistaken. Hideous blow is a standard action that takes the form of an attack. A hit channels the attacker's eldritch blast against the target in addition to weapon damage. No mention of AoO.

The confusion here likely arises because Invocations generally provoke AoOs in which case you would be right. The hideous blow is an exception to this. Read the first couple of lines.

As a standard action you can make a single melee attack. IF you hit, the target is affected as if struck by your eldritch blast.

The key is that the action being made is an attack. The eldritch blast is a triggered effect of the attack not an action itself. It is akin to having a perpetually charged touch spell. Though ultimately unclear the intent is apparent. It would be the pinnacle of bad design to make an explicitly melee power of this low magnitude provoke an AoO.

In my initial post my statement about hideous blowing through a bow is obviously in error as hideous blow explicitly states melee attacks only. I was more suggesting a bend to the rules to uphold the concept (being able to use HB through a bow but being unable to channel it as a ray otherwise was what I intended).

One other downside to the warlock build is spell failure. I had forgotten that even the eldritch blast is subject to this. Is there an armored casting feat or is that ability exclusively class based? I can't recall.

Voadam · Apr 15, 2008

Barbarian sorcerer 1 dragon disciple is a nice brute mage route, but doesn't really give you many spells to turn into arcane strike fodder though it powers up your martial abilities through becoming draconic which seems a very channeled arcane power path flavor wise.

Spellsword prc in 3e Tome and Blood or 3.5 Complete Warrior is designed around channeling spells into weapon strikes, worth checking them out for the theme.

pawsplay · Apr 16, 2008

Derro said:
I believe you are mistaken. Hideous blow is a standard action that takes the form of an attack. A hit channels the attacker's eldritch blast against the target in addition to weapon damage. No mention of AoO.

The confusion here likely arises because Invocations generally provoke AoOs in which case you would be right. The hideous blow is an exception to this. Read the first couple of lines.

I see no exception. Eldritch blast by default is a standard action, is an attack, and causes an AoO. Point to me this exception you speak of.

szilard · Apr 16, 2008

I think the Hexblade suggestion was dead-on. Full BAB. Good HD. No need for a good Int. Your arcane abilities start out subtle - your enemies just aren't as good when they fight you... but you pick up actual spells later on...

To be fair, it isn't a particularly great class by most accounts, but it seems to fit your concept really well.

-Stuart

Dannyalcatraz · Apr 16, 2008

I like the concept, Im not sure its do-able with your restrictions.

I know, I know! This has fun but suboptimal written all over it.

What level are you starting? How long do you expect the game to go?
Any chance you could spend a bunch of levels as a fighter and then rebuild your character? (see PHB2) this might fit your concept the best.

Things are still sketchy at this point, but knowing this guy, PCs will start between 1st to 3rd level. Duration? Who knows. It depends upon whether he has a full campaign in mind or just a long adventure/campaign like RttToEE, Age of Worms, etc.

As I was reading this thread, something occurred to me: What about some kind of Battle Sorc (or similar)/___________ (Full Divine Caster with same casting stat)/Mystic Theurge with the neccessary Armored Mage & channelling ACFs/feat(s) and so forth? AFAIK, Arcane Strike doesn't specify that the spell channeled has to be arcane and that would seem to maximize the total number of spells the PC could then channel into his melee attacks. Am I wrong? If so, where?

utopia27 · Apr 16, 2008

I'm currently running one of these... background is complex, but I've ended up with:
half-dragon (draconic class progression, Races of Dragon); Battle Sorcerer 7/Rogue 1/Dragon Slayer 3 (Draconomicon)/Eldritch Knight 2

As might be apparent - it's a dragon-heavy campaign... We've got a demon bloodlined character in the party, who hasn't felt compelled to pursue his demonic bloodline quite the same way my character has gone after his draconic one....

BTW, this is too much to try to cram into one character - my feat progressions are all screwed up, and the 'build' profoundly lacks focus. The spell casting has gotten a lot better in recent levels, and the stat bumps from the half-dragon stuff have helped as well. But around 8-11th level, this character was really scattered and sub-optimized. (many ouchies..)

Battle Sorcer is great if your GM will let it in. Otherwise your stuck trying to emulate it with PH II options... it's not an accident it's hard to emulate - Bat Sorc is a thread unbalanced/(highly tuned and well suited to our purposes!). Duskblade may be next-best, though...

Beware hexblade or duskblade - arcane progression prestige classes will continue to use the profoundly crappy spell progressions of these classes, as well as their constrained spell choices.

I hit Dragon Slayer for the 'all martial weapons' (as well as the other goodies) - and the 1st and 3rd level spell casting bump. Leading into the Eldritch Knight class... I have to recommend Eldritch Knight over Spell Sword for the spell casting levels. I also think Abjurant Champion has much to be said for it.

Arcane Strike is rocking - no question, no doubt. I think it drives basic sword-and-board.

I think if I were building the 'inadvertant' spell casting combat bruiser, I think I'd lean towards the fighter/warlock - though I'm having some difficulties with good prestige classes...

cheers - it's a fun build to play.

Derro · Apr 16, 2008

pawsplay said:
I see no exception. Eldritch blast by default is a standard action, is an attack, and causes an AoO. Point to me this exception you speak of.

Right here. About a fifth of the way down. Andy Collins clarified things in a Sage Advice which is where I've drawn my rationale from. I couldn't say which one, I've got hard-copy somewhere.