Are warriors & rogues required at high level?

[Rashak Mani]

My experience is that mages doing the damage directly isnt half as efficient as pumping up group members and making them deal out the damage.

Improved Invisibility = Super Rogues
Greater Magic Weapon = Fighters killing more
etc... etc...

Fireballs can be nice... but sometimes Haste will do just fine.

Work out with your spellcasters your differences.

 

[Endur]

There is also a design component to his question.

What makes your character special? What can your character do that none of the other characters can do?

Once you identify what is special about your character, ask how often does this unique quality come up in a game? And then ask does it come up often enough to meet your requirements?

If your unique qualities aren't being used, then either you should change your character, or ask the other players to change the game to suit your character.

 

[Valiantheart]

It seems both Grishnak and the DM are to blame in this problem but I do think the lion's share of the problem belongs to Grishnak.

A Ranger 7/ Shadowdancer 9 is about as bad a frontline fighter as you can design. You shouldnt expect to make a huge combat impact when you are playing a party scout.

Your build is giving up 5-7 points of BAB over a straight up fighter. Its unfortunately true in 3E but despite spending 3-4 feats TWF is still a vastly inferior fighting style for what you get, especially now that WOTC seems determined to make it a combat style only valid to rogues. Especially when facing off against high AC opponents that -2 points to BAB is brutal. Try to talk your DM into allowing Improved ambidexterity or its equivalent into your campagin world which reduces all TWF penalites by 2 (to -0,-0 or -2,-2 respectively). That would at least make the combat style worth all the feats you have to flush into it.

Also, your character seems tied to a vastly inferior magical item, and although it is not helping it's fine from a character stand point. If the weapon is THAT important to the character then consider having one of the party Wiz/Clr buffing it during downtime. Add Flaming + Frosting or some other combination of elements is always nice.

If you are still set on the Ranger/Shadowdancer idea then ask your DM to allow you to redesign the character a bit. Go with Ranger 12/Shadowdancer 4 and place more focus on STR and less on DEX. You lose only a single point of BAB, are just as good at sneaking, and get the flavor of the Shadowdancer without the useless called shadow.

Good luck...

 

[Valiantheart]

<I love ENWorld delay posting>

 

[Valiantheart]

Delete this one too please. Love that ENWorld delay posting...

 

[Grishnak]

Also, your character seems tied to a vastly inferior magical item, and although it is not helping it's fine from a character stand point. If the weapon is THAT important to the character then consider having one of the party Wiz/Clr buffing it during downtime. Add Flaming + Frosting or some other combination of elements is always nice.

The sword in question has not been an issue, I've only had the flame speed sword for 1 week which wasn't mentioned And I used it on the only encounter I could vs undead, the others were'nt viable due to the creatures faced. I got the life stealing sword when I created the character a while ago and it was 1 of the better choices at my then level.

 

[Ridley's Cohort]

Hi all!
It seems to me (not sure if someone already mentioned this?) that Grishnak is playing the wrong role with the right class or the right role with the wrong class combo.

I get that feeling too.

Grishnak's character looks like a fine character. It just doesn't fit the frontline mold, especially in a smallish party where the campaign favors fast, brutal combats.

It seems to me that character does okay if he can set up a full attack, but on the move + attack he gets one bitty plink for ~17-18 points of damage -- not good enough against CR 16 threats. I have seen 8th level grunts characters do as well. The Shadowjump is a cool ability, but it eats up valuable actions.

 

[Upper_Krust]

Hi all!

Another aspect of this situation is that spellcasting characters are universally about 10% stronger than non-spellcasting characters prior to epic levels (wherein this imbalance inverts itself).

So a 16th-level Cleric is about equal to an 18th-level Fighter.

 

[LuYangShih]

He did mention he had a Barbarian/Frenzied Berserker for 10 weeks, which he was also dissapointed with, and you can hardly say that class combination is not optimized for combat.

 

[buzzard]

He did mention he had a Barbarian/Frenzied Berserker for 10 weeks, which he was also dissapointed with, and you can hardly say that class combination is not optimized for combat.

Then he must do a poor job at melee optimization. In our campaign some people have given up on being spellcasters since the fighters (archers and melee) do most all of the killing. Mine you we still have a high level cleric, who sometimes does dish out alot. Also the high level wizzard enchanter can be very effective.

buzzard