Dwarven Defender / Fighter / Bard

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a shrouded figure
Posts: 402
Joined: Tue Jan 07, 2020 2:18 am

Dwarven Defender / Fighter / Bard

Post by a shrouded figure » Mon Jan 13, 2020 9:29 pm

You know me... I love making dumb characters. I assume this would be a better character to just replace the DD levels with PDK... but I like the idea of a DD and this dude is definitely tanky as hell. I figured wearing masterly elven chain, a dwarven rune wall, and an adamantite helmet as the "required" gear


Immunities:
20% Bludgeon / 10% Piercing / 15% Slashing
Damage Resistance:
18/-

Alignment: Any Lawful
Race: Shield Dwarf
Gift of Strength, Gift of Con, Gift of Hardiness (why not)

STR: 16 + 2 Gift, 18 (24)
DEX: 8
CON: 18 + 2 Gift, 20 (21)
WIS: 8
INT: 16
CHA: 6

Fighter (12) / DD (14) / Bard (4)

F: Weapon Focus, Expertise
F: Improved Expertise
F: Toughness
F: Weapon Specialization
F: --
F: Knockdown, Blind Fight
F: --
DD: --
DD: Improved Critical
DD: --
DD: --
DD: Improved Knockdown
DD: --
DD: --
DD: Skill Focus: Discipline
DD: --
DD: --
Ba: Skill Focus: Taunt
Ba: --
Ba: -- (+1 CON, all others should be STR)
F: Epic Weapon Focus, Epic Weapon Specialization
F: --
DD: --
DD: Armor Skin
DD: --
DD: Epic Damage Reduction
Ba: Epic Skill Focus: Taunt
F: Epic Damage Reduction
F: --
F: Epic Skill Focus: Discipline, Epic Damage Reduction

492 HP (naked, no buffs), 24 BAB
33 Disc, 33 Heal, 33 Lore, 30 Tumble, 30 Taunt, 14 Concentration

(or 14 UMD, I figured the Conc would give you a snowballs chance in hell of a chance to resist not focus'd taunts - of which I assume focusing taunt is VERY RARE)

So from most the builds i've seen, focusing concentration is not common, this would mean that this guy should pretty easily apply spell failure to casters along with the AC penalty of tault (41 Taunt base). He's going to be about impossible to knockdown (53 Disc Base).

AC wise he's not in bad shape during defensive stance and your goal will be to hit 18 Dex with buffs / Gear then cap out your STR / CON (remember there's +2 STR and +4 con for free from Defensive Stance).

** So fair to say, I have no idea if the skill focus' for taunt are even remotely worth it. It felt fun thematically and actually as I thought more it kinda works on this build because there's feats to spare.

Probably could argue it would be better to take Disarm / Imp Disarm or take Iron Will + Lightning Reflexes (saves are pretty scary on this guy @ 23 / 16 / 12).


**could be some merit to switching taunt to spell craft to help on saves..

Let me know what you think!

Shadowy Reality
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Posts: 1237
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Re: Dwarven Defender / Fighter / Bard

Post by Shadowy Reality » Tue Jan 14, 2020 11:11 am

Taunt is virtually useless against casters. Usually they will not be in melee, and they surely will not be in melee long enough for your taunt animation to finish.

It is still a very solid skill against melees, although I am unsure if I would trade it for spellcraft.
Skill Focus are not worth the feats. You can replace by something else, almost anything else.
Those 16 Int also seem dubious, specially because you finish with an odd Constitution score (21). You can either drop it down to 14 and move some points around, or replace the Epic Skill Focus Taunt by a Great Constitution.

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