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Message: <blockquote data-quote="jasin" data-source="post: 3247106" data-attributes="member: 7531">With no armour and no other source of AC (like the monk's Wis bonus), these people are going to get beat up bad.And even with light armour like in 3.0 or a monk-like bonus, it seems kind of weak. Blame it on years of power creep or on years of practice, but even though I initially fell in love with OA in good part because of the blade dancer, today I wouldn't play it except if it's the kind of game where I'm not worrying too much the crunchy goodness of the character I'm playing.I think the blade dancer would be better reworked from the ground up, keeping the concept of the flying wuxia swordsman and trying to translate it into D&D, rather than just updating the abilities from 3.0 to 3.5.The problems I see with the class as it is now (or if it's just updated to 3.5): why are the requirements so difficult? Spellcasting, tumble and BAB, which means you cannot possibly qualify without multiclassing, in many cases needing three classes. Another 3.5 lesson was that multiclassing, especially for spellcasters, without a very good reason isn't a smart move. And I'm not sure the blade dancer specials are good enough a reason.The other thing is that one of the signature abilities (jumping and air walking) gets lost in the noise of the high-level magic extravaganza. The blade dancer, as a wuxia swordsman, can air walk 1/day. Anyone who shells out 54,000 gp can fly at will.A couple of things I'd look towards for a reimagined blade dancer, but which you could find useful even if you're just updating it 3.0 to 3.5: the ability to make effectively running jumps without a running start, like the ninja ability or the PHB2 feat Leap of the Heavens. It should be available either as a very early special or as a requirement (if you're working under the assumption that PHB2 is available).Some of the swift spells from Complete Adventurer: swift expeditious retreat lets you do "burst of inhuman speed" without changing your, swift fly is the perfect "wuxia leap" ability.The improved Spring Attack feats in PHB2, which let you make two or three attacks on a Spring Attack: IMO, this is something of a quintessential wuxia ability, since it breaks the good offence (full attack) vs. bounciness (standard attack + move) trade off and lets you have both.Combat bonuses when you move, to encourage bounciness, like the scout. Would work especially well combined with the feats above.Finally, <a href="http://www.enworld.org/showthread.php?t=136150" target="_blank">here</a> is a partially written up wuxia warrior class I made. It's pretty different in concept than the blade dancer, but I hope you might find something useful in it anyway.</blockquote>

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