Thinking of making a 8 rogue, 6 fighter and 16 sd (dex) goblin, but I suck at making builds and need help.

[Epik]

I've thought of trying to make this for a while, but just struggling on approaching it, I've an idea as to what skills to pick, but level progression is just where I'm lost. Any advice?

[Waldo52]

STR 8
DEX 20(22)
CON 14(16)
INT 14
WIS 8
CHA 8

This is probably the optimal ability score setup, but there's a bit of wiggle room.

Dex 22 is annoying in a build because you'll eventually need Great Dexterity to attain an even number. If you don't feel like min maxing and want a free feat in epics, drop a Dex to 21 and invest some points in strength (quality of life, damage) or wisdom (will saves).

Con 16 is optimal for surviving but if you're a player that likes having a lot of skill points you can keep it at 14 and gift Int to 16 instead.

I would advise that you start with rogue levels, because 4x skill ranks at level one means you get a lot more mileage out of this skilly class.

As far as when to take what, I would do something like this for a 8/6/16 split:

1-3 rogue
4-7 fighter
8-17 shadowdancer
18 fighter
19-20 rogue
21-28 shadowdancer
29 fighter
30 rogue

You definitely want your last fighter level as close to level 30 as possible so you can max out discipline
A rogue level at 30 is a good idea for maxing out UMD and other rogue skills that shadowdancer doesn't have.

Your pre epic feats would look something like this:

1) Expertise
3) Dodge
4) Mobility (fighter)
5) Weapon Focus (fighter)
6) Improved expertise
7) Weapon specialization (fighter)
9) Blind Fight
12) Improved Critical
15) Free feat. Toughness? Skill focus?
18) Iron Will

Some might suggest taking Luck of heroes at level one and pushing your other feats back. This will kind of hurt in terms of leveling up as it's useless against early level mobs, but it's fantastic for PVP.

Without going into full detail on epic feats I'd recommend that you go for blinding speed, epic dodge, epic shadowlord, ESF Discipline and epic weapon focus as absolutely essential.

I'm not one of the master buildsmiths here so I'd be happy if anyone wanted to correct me or add anything. That said, this should be okayish starting advice.

[Epik]

Thank you so much.

[Eyeliner]

I'd probably take ambidexterity, 2-weapon fighting and improved 2-weapon instead of improved crit and iron will so you can max out attacks but it's your preference. I played a similar character who took skill mastery for their rogue 7 feat and maxed out use traps and that worked well, you probably want high use traps regardless. Might look at poisons too since you're a goblin.

This is a great PVE build but you need some underhanded tactics for PVP since you can't rely on the shadow sneak attack bonus there and may not do enough damage to prevail (though if you want a character who can escape almost anything, this will do it)

[Epik]

And what weapons would go best with 2 weapon fighting?

[Azensor]

theres plenty of flexibility with the build, want more con and instead of int gift con, want abit more str can easily dump int to 14 then pump str.
You can also fit something other than the will feats if you like, i take them purely for pvp considerations+ the imp expertise at lvl 18 that you can just pick whatever at

just noticed i never updated the build lol, i swapped out expertise for iron will.

[Epik]

Thank you, very useful.

[Drowble Oh Seven]

And what weapons would go best with 2 weapon fighting?

One-handed edged (a group including swords, daggers, and the like) is the usual go-to. If you drop 30 points in Use Magic Device, you can use the Dead Man's Cross; a dagger with +4 enchantment, keen, and a runic slot to add a further quality of your choice. That said, there's plenty of options to choose from. Provided it's finessable, you shouldn't have tremendous issues.

One other (quite situational, admittedly) toy in the dex-shadowdancer toolbox can be parry. I found it fun when I played a similar build. It's a little finnicky to use, but the ripostes can let you punish people for attacking your character directly while you (with your bucketload of sneak attacks) can punish anyone who goes after your shadow. It's a bit of a niche situation though, and whether it's worth devoting any consideration to really depends on how you want to play.

Edit: No-one asked me for build critiques, but I'm doing it anyway. Crippling strike may not be quite as valuable now as it used to be, with the advent of anti-gravity spheres to inflate the carry weight of scrawny mages everywhere, and you'll flat out never notice you've got it in PvE. You could probably swap it out for your choice of fun rogue gimmick feat. Signature weapon for a scrap more AB (I'm unsure how this pairs for dual-wielding builds, and whether it applies to both hands if the weapon is of the same sort?), or Skirmish Maneuvers for a slightly better dirty fighting could be handy.

Edit 2: Also, just a quality-of-life thing. Make sure to pick up some Summon Creature scrolls for your first few levels before you get your shadow, if you're struggling to find people to party with. You've very dependent on sneak attacks, and having a summon to guard you can make those early levels a lot less painful.

[Azensor]

And what weapons would go best with 2 weapon fighting?

One-handed edged (a group including swords, daggers, and the like) is the usual go-to. If you drop 30 points in Use Magic Device, you can use the Dead Man's Cross; a dagger with +4 enchantment, keen, and a runic slot to add a further quality of your choice. That said, there's plenty of options to choose from. Provided it's finessable, you shouldn't have tremendous issues.

One other (quite situational, admittedly) toy in the dex-shadowdancer toolbox can be parry. I found it fun when I played a similar build. It's a little finnicky to use, but the ripostes can let you punish people for attacking your character directly while you (with your bucketload of sneak attacks) can punish anyone who goes after your shadow. It's a bit of a niche situation though, and whether it's worth devoting any consideration to really depends on how you want to play.

Edit: No-one asked me for build critiques, but I'm doing it anyway. Crippling strike may not be quite as valuable now as it used to be, with the advent of anti-gravity spheres to inflate the carry weight of scrawny mages everywhere, and you'll flat out never notice you've got it in PvE. You could probably swap it out for your choice of fun rogue gimmick feat. Signature weapon for a scrap more AB (I'm unsure how this pairs for dual-wielding builds, and whether it applies to both hands if the weapon is of the same sort?), or Skirmish Maneuvers for a slightly better dirty fighting could be handy.

Edit 2: Also, just a quality-of-life thing. Make sure to pick up some Summon Creature scrolls for your first few levels before you get your shadow, if you're struggling to find people to party with. You've very dependent on sneak attacks, and having a summon to guard you can make those early levels a lot less painful.

crippling strike is pretty much purely pve qol in combat, and sig weapon is..ehh it wont work with shortsword+dagger only one weapon type