D&D 3E/3.5 New to D&D 3.5 and need help or advice for a scout build

[Dignus]

Hi guys, im new to the forum and i need some help cuz i started playing role playing games a few months ago and recently a D&D 3.5 game with a few friends and im getting the hang of it but im still totally new and i think i´ve made a few mistakes already (english is not my main languaje so excuse me for the errors that u will read in this post ).

I´ve made a scout, im currently lvl 7 (the starting lvl was 5) and later on i read about the swift hunter and how amazing it is, but it was too late for me bcz it says that u should only take 4 or 5 lvls of scout and then ranger, im way past that and i dont think it would do any good to my char since all the feats that would come from free from the ranger i already chose it for my scout.

I want to optimize my scout to be a badass archer with high output dmg (i think that is the term, to do a lot of dmg) and i´ve been searching and searching, read a lots of books, the complete series, tomes, u name it.

I think i should go for the presstige class Highland Stalker to improve my BAB and skirmish but i dont know if that would be better than going all scout the 20 lvls.

So far i was thinking about going to greater manyshot with my improve skirmish to do lots of dmg, but i read about the travel devotion feat, but to be sincere with u guys, i dont understand why is better to skirmish so if u guys can help me to comprehend it too, it would be awesome.

So, to sum up, i need any help u guys can give me to improve a scout lvl 7 considering that if the game goes well, we will get to lvl 40, so i have a lot of freedom to do multiclassing and i need the advice of experienced players since im not .

Thx a lot to everyone that can share his/her wisdom with me

 

[Ahnehnois]

If you're trying to make a great archer, I'd say Highland Stalker is a better choice than ranger, as you've correctly noted the bonus feats from ranger are not helpful to you.

Since you're talking about going to 40 (very ambitious), it's really a question of whether you want the benefits of being an epic scout or not. I'd say highland stalker for full BAB is a better call.

but to be sincere with u guys, i dont understand why is better to skirmish so if u guys can help me to comprehend it too, it would be awesome.

The advantage of skirmish is that many enemies would like to full attack you in melee and make several attacks in a round. By moving before you attack you generally move to where they cannot do this (as they must be in melee with you at the start of their turn to full attack you). You should Tumble to avoid attacks of opportunity while moving. The skirmish bonuses then make your one attack per round better than theirs (hopefully). The idea is that since you are optimized to fight while moving, you will be better at it than those who are not.

 

[Dignus]

Thx a lot for answering so fast . I think u r right and i should go with Higland Stalker, but at which lvl do u think i should get it?

Also, the doubt i had about skirmish, it wasnt about skirmish itself, (i think i didnt wrote it correctly so it can be missunderstood). It was about why everyone i read that talks about skirmish, says that the feat travel devotion is the best way to do skirmish dmg bcz it let u move as a swift action and then take a full progression attack, and not doing it the old fashion way moving 10 feet (or 20 for improve skirmish) and then activate greater manyshot.

 

[Ranger19k]

Greater Many shot is a good way to activate skirmish damage, but it severely limits your number of attacks, and stacks a very painful -4 on to each shot. You are going to be far behind the standard BAB when you finally get a 3rd or 4th shot per round, and the minus to hit on each and every arrow increases to -6, then -8.

Travel devotion, on the other hand, allows you to move as a swift action (which activates your skirmish) and then do a full attack, which gives you all the attacks that you get from your BAB with skirmish damage on each but without the additional negatives. You can also benefit from buffs like haste that give you an extra attack, but only when you full attack. This doesn't help with greater many shot. When you do the math on the increased number of attacks per round and the better to hit bonus on each arrow, it is pretty clear that travel devotion trumps greater many shot as a way to increase skirmish damage in combat.

Honestly, since travel devotion is limited times/day, I usually get both for my scouts, and use greater manyshot for the times when I don't want to or can't activate my travel devotion.

 

[Ahnehnois]

It was about why everyone i read that talks about skirmish, says that the feat travel devotion is the best way to do skirmish dmg bcz it let u move as a swift action and then take a full progression attack, and not doing it the old fashion way moving 10 feet (or 20 for improve skirmish) and then activate greater manyshot.

A full attack gives you much better options than manyshot. For example, precision-based damage like skirmish applies only to one arrow in a manyshot, but if you full attack, you get it on every attack. There's also the attack penalties for multishot. Also manyshot costs multiple feats to do well, but anyone can full attack. Essentially, a normal scout is trading his full attack for skirmish benefits, but if you use Travel Devotion, you're getting the full attack back (a few times a day). Frankly, it's a bit of a loophole in the rules.

I don't think there's any hurry on Highland Stalker; just make sure you get in by 11th level. You want to be able to take all 10 levels of Highland Stalker by the time you reach level 20 overall, because base attack bonus stops accumulating at that point.

 

[Empirate]

Depending on how long your campaign is going to go on, you might want to go Ranger over Highland Stalker nevertheless. The Ranger's chassis is simply better than the Highland Stalker's (skillpoints, actual class features besides combat style, SPELLS).

A very important argument for Ranger with Swift Hunter is the fact that Swift Hunter lets you use skirmish damage against all your favored enemies: pick common crit-immunes, and your skirmish ability will be much more universally useful. Undead first, then Elementals or Constructs would be my favored enemy choices for this reason.

Also, you can take the awesome Wildshape Ranger variant, which loses you Combat Style, but gains you fast movement and the ability to wildshape from level 5 onwards. This opens up a lot of versatility in and out of combat. It also opens up the possibility of Wild feats (which can be rather good), or dipping Master of Many Forms for two levels (giving you large size wildshape, and humanoid and giant shapes, as well as the ability to speak in wildshaped form).

 

[Shin Okada]

A full attack gives you much better options than manyshot. For example, precision-based damage like skirmish applies only to one arrow in a manyshot, but if you full attack, you get it on every attack. There's also the attack penalties for multishot. Also manyshot costs multiple feats to do well, but anyone can full attack. Essentially, a normal scout is trading his full attack for skirmish benefits, but if you use Travel Devotion, you're getting the full attack back (a few times a day). Frankly, it's a bit of a loophole in the rules..

In case of Greater Many Shot (Expanded Psionics Handbook) , precision-based damage applies to all the arrows. So, it could be a better option indeed, as Travel Devotion has limited use/day. With appropriate feats and skills, a scout just tumble away from an opponent and use Greater Many Shot unlimited times/day.


Onto the original topic,

If you are already at 7th level, consider start buying multiple +1 "xxx" bane arrows (maybe made of various special materials) whenever possible. Skirmish damage + Bane damage bonus is great. Bane helps attack roll, too. In overall, it will be much better than trying to make one powerful magic bow. A friend of mine played a Dwarf Scout/Ranger from 4th-level to 21st-level. At later levels, his character record sheet was filled with, say "+1 Evil Outsider Bane Alchemical Silver Arrow x100" and such.

By the way, it is not too late to take Swift Hunter. Having 6+ levels in Scout class has it's advantage, say, having more skills, gaining blindsense at Scout 10 and such.

Also, talk with your DM if you can re-make your PC. When playing D&D, you will likely to find some better options when you read another book. It is not fun to continue playing the current PC as it is, when you know you can make a similarly themed but yet stronger PC at the same level. Your play group may follow the retraining and re-construction rule as per PHB II. Or, the DM can just allow players to re-adjust their PCs when a new book is introduced to the play group.

 

[StreamOfTheSky]

I'd just like to 2nd everything said here:

Depending on how long your campaign is going to go on, you might want to go Ranger over Highland Stalker nevertheless. The Ranger's chassis is simply better than the Highland Stalker's (skillpoints, actual class features besides combat style, SPELLS).

A very important argument for Ranger with Swift Hunter is the fact that Swift Hunter lets you use skirmish damage against all your favored enemies: pick common crit-immunes, and your skirmish ability will be much more universally useful. Undead first, then Elementals or Constructs would be my favored enemy choices for this reason.

Also, you can take the awesome Wildshape Ranger variant, which loses you Combat Style, but gains you fast movement and the ability to wildshape from level 5 onwards. This opens up a lot of versatility in and out of combat. It also opens up the possibility of Wild feats (which can be rather good), or dipping Master of Many Forms for two levels (giving you large size wildshape, and humanoid and giant shapes, as well as the ability to speak in wildshaped form).

Although possibly ask the DM about retraining feats so the Ranger combat style is actually useful. Wildshape Ranger is definitely more powerful, but you're going to be really feat starved, every little bit helps. If not, then do Wildshape Ranger.

Take a ranger level right away, at the very least in time for your level 9 feat, which will be Swift Hunter. You can raise Scout to 8 if you want, but past that you'll just lose more BAB. And a cloistered cleric level (if you're doing 1 or 2 levels only, it's pretty much just plain better than normal cleric) is definitely helpful. I'd recommend swapping Knowledge and Travel domains for their respective devotion feats in Complete Champion. Full attack skirmish as much as possible against tough fights, save the travel devotion for them (unless your charisma is an utter train wreck you should be able to use at least 2/day by burning turn undead uses). Manyshot and Greater Manyshot suck, the penalties are massive, the number of attacks small, and the other limits, like attacking the same guy, are annoying. When you can't full attack skirmish, just choose between full attacking or single attack skirmish. See if a caster can help you out, there are spells like Slide and Benign Trasposition to move an ally, and if MIC is available, there's tons of swift action movement items in there.

What race are you, btw? If you have Elf blood, the 1st level ranger sub. level in Races of the Wild is decent, get a higher favored enemy bonus against undead (and a bunch of other enemy types not commonly immune to crits that you thus don't care about ) if you pick them. Not amazing, but decent.

It's a shame the way your build turned out, your level 9+ feats are going to be really tight.
You seem to have Improved Skirmish and know about Swift Hunter, so aside from the devotion feats, I also recommend Woodland Archer tactical feat and when you have the BAB for it, Improved Precise Shot. Of course, you should have Point Blank, Precise, and Rapid Shot by now.

Also consider getting Seeking on your bow. It's a +1 equivalent and means your precision damage won't get screwed over by miss chance. MIC also has some nice things, mainly the Force special property.

 

[Dignus]

this is very helpfull, like i said im new so there are a lot of things that i dont know but ive been reading many books to try to optimie my scout. The thing is that there are limitation in our campaign, and there is no arcane magic, just divine, so improving my skills with magic is not possible.

I´ve been looking the possibility of the highland stalker again, but what i see is that i get a much better BAB, but i loose many free and class based feats that i would get with just plain scout and i dont know if that is smart.

I cannot re-write my pc, thats really annoying, and thats why im looking for every way to improve it.

To understand better (bear with me, i know it may be annoying but i dont know too much about this ) the travel devotion feat and why is better, so, i can make a full attack using it, but, how many arrows can i shoot with a full atack? i mean , the thing that i liked about greater manyshot was the dmg in every arrow and the volley effect, but if there is another way to make the volley, that would be awesome. I think that it could be with rapid shot but im not sure, i have it ofc.

Ive read a lot about cloistered cleric, but i couldnt find it in any book, i have many books in english and some in spanish so maybe it is in one of those, but if u can tell me in which book it is it would be awesome.

So , if u guys say that its not too late for going swift hunter, should i wait till lvl 9 to get it?

Also, and thinking outside of the box, ive been looking into the prestige class skylord in the book of exalted deeds, the thing about shooting my precision based attacks from the sky in a pegasus sounds really cool, lol. Just tell me if u think its a waste of time or if it can be viable.

Like i said b4, the campaign, if it goes well, could reach lvl 40, but the idea is that at lvl 20 we should be really something to keep progressing in the campaign, and thats where im kind of lost, how to make an awesome archer by lvl 20.

Im really gratefull for all ur answers and i hope u can keep giving me advice in this subject guys

 

[kitcik]

Although you can't "follow the book" since you have already advanced levels, this guide is worth looking at.