[Bo9S] Notes on swordsage in play

[Satori]

I just wanted to pop in and express my gratitude for the very detailed explanation of a Swordsage in play. I've been dying to play one, but haven't found a game yet that allows ToB.

Rather than simply say, "They suck" or "They rock", you've given extremely detailed descriptions of how you've been successful and how you've failed.

Thanks!

 

[Felon]

Since his point is that with the class you are limited to melee then saying you could have been something else does not really seem to hold any weight.

The arguement you're crticizing holds weight quite well. If you play a fighter, you know you're not going to be a spellcaster, so any suggestion that you should be compensated with a d12 hit die upgrade for lack of spellcasting is unreasonable. Likewise, the rationale that the warblade's lack of ranged attacks and maximized hit die somehow correlate and cancel out is a little light in the logic department. A warblade is all about melee, and it should be balanced against characters that are also all about melee, and then only in purely melee situations.

It is limited to melee almost exclusively and it only goes up to medium armor. Plus it has some multiple attribute dependency issues.

All-told, medium armor might cost a whole point or two of AC over heavy armor. If that. And it allows for better Tumble checks, something a WB is wont to do anyway.

The warblade is not dependent on multiple ability scores in the true sense of the word "dependency". He reaps benefits for having a high Int, but does not need it to perform in the sense that a monk needs a high Wis. He "needs" it in the sense that a warmage needs it, because he enjoys some perk that he can actually perform handsomely without.

 

[Fedifensor]

Likewise, the rationale that the warblade's lack of ranged attacks and maximized hit die somehow correlate and cancel out is a little light in the logic department. A warblade is all about melee, and it should be balanced against characters that are also all about melee, and then only in purely melee situations.

With no proficiency with ranged weapons, there are several situations where a warblade has no option other than standing around (or taking the -4 nonproficiency). With a good strength bow, a fighter can at least do something against a ranged attacker. Unless the warblade can get ahold of magic that gives him the ability to get into melee, he's in trouble.

All-told, medium armor might cost a whole point or two of AC over heavy armor. If that. And it allows for better Tumble checks, something a WB is wont to do anyway.

Best medium armor is a breastplate for +5 AC, while the best heavy armor is full plate for +8 AC. Looks like a 3 point difference to me.

The warblade is not dependent on multiple ability scores in the true sense of the word "dependency". He reaps benefits for having a high Int, but does not need it to perform in the sense that a monk needs a high Wis. He "needs" it in the sense that a warmage needs it, because he enjoys some perk that he can actually perform handsomely without.

That is true. However, in order to make up for the AC loss from not wearing armor, the warblade's Dex needs to be higher. So you're looking at Str, Dex, and Con, with Int as a nice bonus.

 

[jasin]

All-told, medium armor might cost a whole point or two of AC over heavy armor. If that. And it allows for better Tumble checks, something a WB is wont to do anyway.

You cannot tumble in medium armour.

 

[boolean]

You cannot tumble in medium armour.

Unless you're a dwarf.

 

[hong]

Okay, Dragotha.

We didn't fight the mother of all worms immediately, of course. We cleared out the Tabernacle first, killing a dragon watchdog and several hapless avolakia flunkies. It's a funny state of affairs when you can call spellcasters with finger of death "hapless flunkies", but I'm not complaining.

The avolakias (avolakii? avolakiae?) were no match for either diamond nightmare blade, or the dwarf barbarian with the holy greatsword. I got embarrassed enough by regularly one-shotting them with 200+ points with DNB that I declared I was no longer using this maneuver in the first round.

Mind you, I'm something of a flat-track bully compared to the dwarf. DNB works well against low-to-middling AC opponents, against whom I can Power Attack for everything. If the AC is high, I have to resort to greater insightful strike, whose damage output is half that of DNB. Both of these are also usable only 1/encounter, barring refreshes. The dwarf when raging is able to deal 200+ points every round with a full attack even against tough opposition, and closer to 300 if Power Attacking against evil undead.

It's perhaps an indication of relative strengths. The barb (or any other conventional tank) is strongest with a full attack; if forced to move around, he's much less dangerous. By contrast, a swordsage doesn't put out that much more damage if given the opportunity to make a full attack; for me at least, I'm actually more dangerous if I use a strike. This has its good and bad points. Good -- I have the flexibility to move around the battlefield without worrying that I'm wasting attacks; bad -- I can't amp up the damage if needed.

Another downside of full attacks is that you're left standing next to the bad guy, and if they're as nasty as you, that could be bad. As stated before the dwarf has come close to being killed several times, and he has ~70% more hit points than me (and even more when raging). Still, there's no doubt that he's the main offensive weapon in this group, with a couple of healers backing him up if required.

Still, I managed to steal a number of kills from under the dwarf's beard: he'd be next to a monster and ready to make a full attack next round, and I'd run in and loose off a strike, killing it with one blow. Most amusing.

Oh yeah, Dragotha.

The generally slimy, putrescent, unclean feel of the whole dungeon had us in mind that we had entered a gigantic digestive passage, leading to the question of whether there were intestinal villi lining the walls. And indeed there were; or at least lots of Kyuss worms on the walls, floors and doors, trying to eat anything that touched them. They didn't actually slow us down much, since most of us had flight by this time, and those who didn't could be carried. I SHOULD have made a comment at some point about the Diet of Worms, but I was distracted at the time.

Anyway, before we got to Dragotha, we had to fight his watchdog: a gargantuan wormdrake, guarding a circular passage extending upwards and downwards. It also proved to be not that much of a challenge. The dwarf knocked off half its hit points, and 5-shadow creeping whatsit took care of the rest. It had regen /silver though, so the dwarf got the honour of finishing it off due to having a silver weapon. Improved evasion meant I took no damage at all during this fight, underlining the survivability of the swordsage class (although it helps if someone else is being the damage sponge).

There's also something cool, when the DM says "make a Fort save!", being able to reply "no!" and tap mind over body. There were also to jokes about using Cartesian dualism to separate your mind from your body, especially when the Fort save was to avoid worms burrowing into your brain.

Dragotha, yes, yes.

Twice in the session I used diamond defense, rolled a 2, and escaped by the skin of my teeth. One of these times was after losing 4 negative levels, which brought up the question of how initiator levels and readied maneuvers are affected by energy drain. We resolved it as per caster levels, so I was effectively down -8 from a typical use of diamond defense (-4 penalty to the saving throw, and another -4 due to reduced IL). Interesting negative synergy there.

So, anyway, we finally got to Dragotha.

Well, we didn't get to Dragotha RIGHT AWAY. First we had a final meeting with Bucknard Balakarde's ghost first, who gave us the complete rundown on the dragon's stats. Complete enough for most purposes anyway: immune to everything, SR 35, AC 58, 17th caster level, 800+ hit points, etc, etc. The most important bit of information we got was the paralyzing gaze, so we went in buffed with freedom of action and blindsight along with haste, heroism, heroes' feast, prayer and other stuff. We were, like, glowing in the dark by the time we met the bad guy.

The FIRST thing that Dragotha did was taunt us about Lashonna being a servant of Evil. To which we're like, "duh, really!" The SECOND thing that he did was command us to bow down or flee. To which we're like, "no, we're staying!" I guess our massacring his flunkies must have done something to his self-confidence.

Time to roll initiative. Let's just say that this was NOT a good time for me to roll a 1.

The wizard goes first, and casts time stop, followed by gating in a solar. (Hey, if you're fighting something this big, you might as well have fun.) Unfortunately, he forgot about the paralyzing aura, so the solar freezes up as soon as the time stop runs out. Thankfully the solar has wish 1/day, which he immediately uses to cast freedom of movement.

Dragotha goes next and blasts everyone with a (quickened, clinging) negative energy breath. It's only 120 points, following by another 60 next round... piece of cake. He follows up with horrid wilting, which is puny by comparison.

I go next. I leap forward, my sword sliding out of its sheath with the aid of a shiny, newly-acquired crystal of return (draw blade as free action), and launch into greater insightful strike. The sword comes down in a glittering arc... to be met by Dragotha's fool's strike counter, from Setting Sun.

FECKIN' KUNG FU DRAGON!

The sound you hear is my butt puckering up at the prospect of an opposed attack roll against a gargantuan dracolich. Amazingly Draggie rolls crap, and I roll great, so I do NOT skewer myself, instead dealing 108 points to him.

Bucknard Balakarde's soul fragments and the bonuses bestowed were the key to winning the fight. +20 insight bonus to attacks for one person, transferable as an immediate action; +2 caster level for one person, transferable as an immediate action; +10 on all saves; evasion; immune to paralysis; immune to fear; and other stuff. I had the +20 attack at the start, which is what allowed me to hit Dragotha with GIS, and win the opposed roll against fool's strike. I handed it off to the barb shortly afterwards. He didn't actually need it to hit Draggie, but it allowed him to Power Attack effectively. Too effectively, in fact; Drag pulls out another Setting Sun counter, this time scorpion parry. So instead of smacking into Drag, the dwarf's greatsword is deflected in its path, continuing on its merry way... straight into me.

FECKIN' KUNG FU DRAGON!

Still, even with only 4 out of 6 attacks hitting, that was enough to make the dwarf the primary target for Draggie's attentions, who hits him right back for even more damage. But he's used to that. He also has a cleric and druid behind him, both with mass heal.

Somewhere in there I also used rabid bear strike and the dwarf hit Draggie a few times more, for another couple hundred points. And so did the cleric and druid, with their mass heals. It's all a bit hazy.

At this point Draggie must have got annoyed at the casters targeting him for a combined 200 points each round, as well as healing up the dwarf. So he puts them into a forcecage... which the wiz blows up with disintegrate. And unfortunately for Drag, he's used his action to cast a spell so he can't attack the dwarf, who is still next to him. So he uses sudden leap, springing into the air and landing behind us all in a thunderous fury!

However, anything a pansy kung fu dragon can do, I can do better. I use sudden leap as well, chasing hard on Draggie's tail, and in midair activate emerald razor, coming down on him for 50 points of damage. Yeah, it's 3 rounds in and already I'm scraping the bottom of the barrel. Luckily so is Dragotha, as the dwarf, pissed that his target ran away and left him behind, comes over and whacks him twice more for 120 points. That's enough to destroy the vaunted dracolich.

We got a shedload of treasure (about 1.1 million gp total!). Pity we can't spend it to our liking, since the adventure path is on a strict timetable and the End Of The World is fast approaching. Next session will be the start of the last module, where we'll be fighting Kyuss and his wailing dire ax. It's all fun and games round here.

 

[Someone]

When reading that I couldn't help but imagine underage characters yelling in japanese while wielding stupidly oversized weapons.

Not meant as a criticism, mind you.

 

[kibbitz]

Didn't sound like Dragotha amounted to much. Also have minor difficulties imagining a gargantuan monster performing kungfu-ish maneuvers on human-sized characters...

 

[Nifft]

When reading that I couldn't help but imagine underage characters yelling in japanese while wielding stupidly oversized weapons.

I would actually like to see transliterations of the "original Japanese" for the various maneuvers, so NPCs could yell them before getting toasted.

Cheers, -- N

PS: Hong, nice to know that 3 rounds is deep into combat with a Swordsage. That makes a lot of sense when I look at high-level spellcasters and their expected number of combat actions vs. number of combats per day.

 

[hong]

Well, Draggie is undead which makes a bunch of strikes useless, like 5-shadow whatsit and others requiring a Fort save. His high AC also rules out diamond nightmare blade (even with the the +20 attack bonus, there's still the issue of the Concentration check). In combat with living creatures (like the group of avolakia priests the previous session) I might go 5-6 rounds before running out.