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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Kraydak" data-source="post: 3666099" data-attributes="member: 12306">Lets think about this.  Take a high strength, moderate dex character.  Starting with a 14 dex (hefty investment if str is your primary stat, but quite doable), +6 (item), +4 (costly tome) nets you +7 to damage (at level 20 or so.  Through lvl 8ish it is only +2.  Stat boosts are very heavily weighted toward high levels).  Impressive.  BUT, the only Shadow Hand weapon you can get strength and a half with, the ONLY (unarmed isn't worthwhile without immensive feat/level expenditure) Shadow Hand weapon you can use with power attack, is the spiked chain.  If you don't use a spiked chain, your damage bonus (no 1.5 str...) could vanish entirely.  In general, it will be reduced to about a +2 (equals weapon spec, but without PA availability).  Yes, you can use a shield with a shortsword, and you can't (without animated shields) using a 2hander, but losing PA is *brutal* at the levels where Shadown Hand could outdo weapon spec.  Spiked chains are good weapons (one of the few exotics that might well be worth the feat), but for a strength based character to make decent use of Shadow Blade, they are required.  Good spiked chain usage is also very feat intensive...  Adding another feat to the mix isn't easy.How about a high dex, low strength character?  We see the same damage gain, at the same attack bonus, with the expenditure of an extra feat (weapon finesse).  This does allow us to focus on a more useful stat in general (dex to AC, saves) although strength does have its advantages (grapples).  The rest of the arguments above still apply (although losing 1.5 strength is far less important).  While the dex bonus to offhand damage is *not* halved (yay!), dual wielding meshes poorly in general with maneuvers (very few maneuvers let you use both weapons), is extremely feat intensive, and is generically a poor weapon style (albiet one that can be optimised for).I'm not saying the Shadow Blade is weak, but even at high levels, with massive stat pumps, it is reasonably balanced.  The Shadow Hand weapon requirement is the killer.  The Shadow Hand stance requirement... can prove more irritating than one might expect.  Swift actions for stance swaps are NOT free for a swordsage with a lot of boosts/counters.And lastly, yes, in a perfectly designed DnD, weapon spec *wouldn't* suck.  3.5 isn't perfectly designed, and weapon spec is embarrasingly weak.  Greater weapon spec... was finally admitted in PHBII to be flat out bad.</blockquote>

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