Archery prestige classes?

[Jdvn1]

I know a guy who made an archer Kensai. Good stuff.

 

[Corinth]

Deepwood Sniper from Masters of the Wild

 

[Rackhir]

Deepwood Sniper from Masters of the Wild

DWS is 3.0 though requires little adaptation for use in 3.5. I think it's the best archery PrC out there BTW. It gives you a bunch of cool archery skills, without being obscenely over powered like the Peerless Archer is.

Darkwoods Stalker is a useless class if you aren't going to be fighting just orcs. Plus it is YET ANOTHER Elf only class. Where are the HUMAN only classes.

In fact I really think the OoBI got nerfed something serious with their sneak attack dice getting swapped out for the "Precision Attack". While the concept fits better, the ability has crippling limitations on it, since the precision attack is a standard action and NOT an attack Action. Especially given it's range limitations, I just can't see where it would be preferable to use it vs a full attack.

Kensai with it's self enchanting weapon does have some interesting possiblities for an archer so it is worth considering. However, it does little aside from that to improve one's archery skills IIRC (I may well be wrong on this).

Craigtop archer is kind of a sucky version of DWS.

Complete Adventurer iirc has a bunch of really terrific ranger spells for archers. One of the best being a 1st lvl spell that enables you to threaten the standard 5' area with a bow. That pretty much kills the only reason for taking OoBI, which is to get the Close Combat shot ability (no AoOs from firing a bow in a threatened area). Another lets you do the Arrow Storm bit (Fire an arrow into 1 targ/lvl or something like that). There's a couple others that I forget just now.

You know there really oughta be a good mounted archer prestige class. I don't recall ever seeing one. Mounted archery can really kick ass, since you can get a full move for your mount and still get in a full attack.

 

[Len]

Complete Adventurer iirc has a bunch of really terrific ranger spells for archers. One of the best being a 1st lvl spell that enables you to threaten the standard 5' area with a bow.

Arrow Mind. My DM hates that spell.

The prestige class I'm using for my ranger archer is Fighter.

 

[ARandomGod]

*slaps forehead* Okay, any archery PrCs aside from the Order of the Bow Initiate and the painfully obvious Arcane Archer?

Darkwood Stalker was a good mention, I thought their bonus applied to all weapons vs. orcs, not just ranged weapons.

Well, noone can blame you for missing the Arcane Archer. A generally subpar class in 3.0 which was nerfed to practical non-existance in 3.5 can easily be overlooked. It's not really there at all anyway, it's just a figment.

Anyhow... the best archer I ever built was fighter/ranger/horizon walker/shadowdancer. All core and very nasty at higher levels.

 

[Scharlata]

There's the Order of the Bow Initiate in Complete Warrior, but are there any other 3.5 archery classes out there?

Hi!

• INFUSED (Dragon #321, p. 17), take the path of the Solar

• BOWMAN CHARGER (Dragon #325, p. 81)

• RANGER KNIGHT OF FURYONDY (Dragon #317, p. 68)???????

• LONGBOWMAN (Farland)

Enjoy!

 

[Rackhir]

http://boards1.wizards.com/showpost.php?p=2798433

This is a list with links where possible of PrCs and sources.

 

[the Jester]

In fact I really think the OoBI got nerfed something serious with their sneak attack dice getting swapped out for the "Precision Attack". While the concept fits better, the ability has crippling limitations on it, since the precision attack is a standard action and NOT an attack Action. Especially given it's range limitations, I just can't see where it would be preferable to use it vs a full attack.

They were overpowered in 3.0, now they're balanced (imho). The ranged precision ability shines against good DR, or if you want to move instead of full attack.

 

[Rackhir]

They were overpowered in 3.0, now they're balanced (imho). The ranged precision ability shines against good DR, or if you want to move instead of full attack.

I've run OoBIs and archers for most of the time since 3.0 got released. I never found their sneak attack dice to be of much use frankly, so I'm not seeing how they were overpowered. Since even with Close-Combat shot you don't threaten an area it's difficult for an archer to be able to create the conditions to be able to use sneak attack dice.

DR is one of the few concievable uses for the Precision attack, but one of the advantages to being an archer is that it is much easier to use the "Golf Bag of Weapons" with arrows. So DR usually shouldn't be the problem for an archer that it is for other combat characters.

It's also my experience that the times when an archer needs to move and shoot are relatively infrequent. Typically a 5' step will suffice and you can do a full attack or more than a single move is needed and you aren't going to be able to attack anyway. If the precision attack had been an attack action it would have been substantially more useful since it would have at last made Shot on the Run of some use.

 

[Ruvion]

If the precision attack had been an attack action it would have been substantially more useful since it would have at last made Shot on the Run of some use.

It does make the Manyshot feat more useful.