Can Duskblades do this?

[Andor]

Or just take a free action to take one hand off the hilt of your greatsword, cast the spells, free action to grasp it properly again. Seems pretty reasonable to me.

 

[Victim]

Duskblades are pretty front loaded as far as hitting power goes, with both Blade of Blood and SHocking Grasp at first level. Those are still their best spells for damage until 10th level, when Vampiric Touch hits 5d6 (where grasp was 5 levels ago).

So it's pretty much all down hill after level 5.

 

[Folly]

Duskblades are pretty front loaded as far as hitting power goes, with both Blade of Blood and SHocking Grasp at first level. Those are still their best spells for damage until 10th level, when Vampiric Touch hits 5d6 (where grasp was 5 levels ago).

So it's pretty much all down hill after level 5.

That completely ignores half of the effect of Vampiric Touch. Of course its not going to do as much damage, because you gain all that damage as temporary hit points.

 

[Arkhandus]

Defeating your opponent quicker is generally better than making yourself a little bit harder to kill. Since the longer they're still fighting, the more chances they have to beat on you, which could be strong enough beatings to overcome whatever bit of extra toughness you've eked out. Especially if the opponent gets a critical hit against you during his extra time alive/conscious.

 

[Victim]

That completely ignores half of the effect of Vampiric Touch. Of course its not going to do as much damage, because you gain all that damage as temporary hit points.

Yeah, I never said VT was terrible; I really liked using it on my duskblade. There aren't really any high level alternative spells to channel on the DB list though. So when you look at how much damage the Duskblade does versus its level, the class peaks quickly. Let's look at Blade of Blood plus their best channeled (normal version only) touch attack.

3: +6d6
4: +7d6
5: +8d6
6: +8d6
...
12: +9d6
14: +10d6
etc.

The freakish spike damage that the class delivers at level 3-5 disapears as they level up.

 

[Nifft]

The freakish spike damage that the class delivers at level 3-5 disapears as they level up.

Add in Arcane Strike at level 9 and see what happens.

Vampiric Touch + Arcane Strike on a 13th level Arcane Channeling (full attack) should yield a significant benefit, particularly since Vampiric Touch nicely offsets Blade of Blood's HP cost next round.

Cheers, -- N

 

[moritheil]

This has been pretty much done to death, but it underlines how it's a good idea to generally assume the default, not the opposite. (Default here is that a swift-action spell takes a swift action to cast.)